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THE  DRAMA  OF  TRANSITION 


Books  by 
ISAAC   GOLDBERG 

THE  DRAMA  OF  TRANSITION 

BRAZILIAN  LITERATURE 

STUDIES  IN  SPANISH-AMERICAN 
LITERATURE 

Dramatic  Translations 

SIX  PLAYS  OF  THE  YIDDISH  THEATRE 

First  and  Second  Series 

PLAYS  OF  THE  ITALIAN  THEATRE 

THREE  PLAYS,  by  David  Pinski 

TEN  PLAYS,  by  David  Pinski 

THE  GOD  OF  VENGEANCE,  by  Sholom  Asch 

THE  HAUNTED  INN,  by  Perez  Hirschbein 


THE  DRAMA 
OF  TRANSITION 

Native  and  Exotic  Playcraft 


By 
ISAAC  GOLDBERG 


PUBLISHERS 
STEWART  KIDD  COMPANY 

CINCINNATI 


COPYRIGHT,   1912,  BY 

STEWART  KIDD  COMPANY 


All  rights  reserved 


Printed  in  the  United  States  of  America 

The  Caxton  Press 

"Everybody  for  Books."    This  is  one  0/  the  Irxurlaken  Librani 


TO  MY  WIFE 
ELSIE  FRIEDA 


'i~^ 


THE  ACTOR'S  PROLOGUE 

Once  more  the  mimicry  begins 

With  its  compounded  heritage — 

Of  hopes,  of  fears,  of  sorrows  and  of  sins. 

Once  more  a  little  stage 

Pretends  to  hold  symmetrical  a  play, 

Pointed  by  art,  or  rounded,  or  made  square, 

While  all  the  time  not  here  on  the  stage  but 

there 
Within  you  proceeds  the  authentic  play. 
And  each  of  you,  a  player. 
Day  after  day. 

Performs  behind  a  curtaining  breast 
Some  part  which  we  make  partly  manifest. 

W^e,  too,  are  living  stranger  plays  than  these 
And  wearing,  or  off-stripping  in   some  inner 

room. 
Life's  mask  of  mimicries; 
But  in  this  role  of  scapegoat  we  assume. 
Besides  our  own,  your  solaces,  your  sins. 
Your  worst,  your  best. 

And,  therefore,  whether  we  appear  to  jest 

Or  to  be  solemn,  we  request 

That  you  let  first  your  eyes  and  ears  and  then 

your  hands  attest 
Our  humanness — if  we  speak  true 
Some  accent  of  that  deeper  play  containing  you. 

Witter  Bynner. 


FOREWORD 

In  a  sense,  despite  the  title  of  this  book,  there  is 
no  such  thing  as  a  transition  drama.  Playwrights 
follow  their  calling  for  money  or  for  fame,  or  for 
whatever  else  you  will,  but  not  for  the  purpose  of 
establishing  compact  compartments  in  a  historical 
survey.  A  world  always  in  flux  is  a  world  ever  in 
transition;  change  is  the  law  of  hfe.  Indeed,  Mr. 
Dukes,  in  an  excellent  book  upon  the  drama,  has 
made  use  of  the  term  transition  in  a  sense  quite  the 
opposite  to  that  which  it  bears  in  our  present  title. 
Employing  as  his  example  the  German  designation 
Uebergangsmensch  (i.  e.,  one  belonging  to  the  transi- 
tion), he  selected  it  for  its  connotation  of  advance- 
ment to  an  ever  beckoning  goal.  His  conception 
of  transition-men  was  thus  the  heroic  one  of  leaders 
at  first  reviled,  then  but  half  understood  even  by 
their  admirers,  and  only  at  last  triumphant  among 
the  few  who  really  count.  That  is  a  valid  inter- 
pretation and  one  of  which  Mj.  Dukes  made  such 
good  use  that  some  ten  years  later  a  countrywoman 
of  his.  Storm  Jameson,  elaborated  it  into  a  valiant 
book  which,  together  with  that  of  Mr.  Dukes  and 
other  contemporary  critics  of  the  drama,  will  re- 
ceive due  consideration  in  the  pages  that  follow.^ 
The  more  current   acceptation  of  transition,  how- 

'Mr.  Havelock  Ellis,  in  the  Postscript  to  the  sixth  and  final  volume  of  his  re- 
markable Studies  in  the  Psychology  of  Sex,  has  expressed  the  dynamic  conception  of 
transition  so  well  that  I  cannot  forbear  quoting  him  (pages  641-642):  "But  the 
wise  man,  standing  midway  between  both  parties  and  sympathizing  with  each, 
knows  that  we  are  ever  in  the  stage  of  transition.  The  present  is  in  every  age 
merely  the  shifting  point  at  which  past  and  future  meet,  and  we  can  have  no 
quEirrel  with  either.    There  can  be  no  world  without  traditions;  neither  can  there 


10  FOREWORD 

ever,  is  that  of  a  comparative  lull  in  creative  ac- 
tivity and  of  a  period  marked  rather  by  the  decline 
from  high  achievements,  by  restlessness,  experiment, 
and  eager  groping. 

It  would  be  easy,  of  course,  to  begin  a  survey  of 
immediate  causes  with  the  late  madness  in  Europe, 
just  as  the  older  historians  began  their  tomes  with 
the  Creation.  But  just  as  the  Creation,  to  modern 
history,  is  a  rather  recent  date  in  the  career  of  this 
globe,  so  were  disintegrating  forces  at  work  before 
1914,  and  it  may  well  be  that  the  war,  far  from 
being  a  cause  of  artistic  disintegration,  was  a  vast 
economic  effect  of  influences  that  had  long  been  at 
work  in  every  sphere  of  human  activity. 

In  any  event,  between  the  peaks  lie  valleys.  If 
some,  like  Miss  Jameson,  prefer  to  leap  from  peak 
to  peak,  that  is  their  enviable  privilege;  the  exercise 
is  strenuous,  but  exhilarating,  and  is  taken  less 
often  only  because  few  critics  possess  the  seven- 
league  boots  that  hold  the  secret  of  these  gigantic 
strides.  Yet  there  must  be  occasional  rep>ose  even 
from  peak-climbing;  it  is  good  to  rest  the  eye  upon 
undulating  prairies  and  even  modest  meadows. 
They  are  part  of  the  same  mother  earth,  though 
not  so  near  the  moon,  and  they  have  their  own 
amenities.  Rome  was  not  built  in  a  day,  nor  did 
Ibsen  or  Strindberg  or  Hauptmann  rise  up  over 
night,  blown  out  of  an  intangible  fancy.  Let  there 
be  no  misunderstanding  on  this  score,  and  let  no 
terrestrial   analogies   mislead   us;   disparagement  of 

be  any  life  without  movement.  As  Heradeitus  knew  at  the  outset  of  modern 
philosophy,  we  cannot  bathe  twice  in  the  same  stream.  thouRh!  as  ue  knov.  t^^ 
the  stream  still  flows  in  an  unending  circle.     There  is  never  a  mompnt  Vh.^fh; 

ceTseft:"d i'l  X  ^r^^rJoZ^y^^^  and'^'?J';fe/a"mo;e^t"'Xn"\he''sunt' 
ceases  to  die.     It  is  well  to  greet  serenely  even  the  first  glimmer  of  dawn  when  we 

^t^dTfo^rthTli-d^^nTShl  Si^  on^r^^;^y  '^^'^^  J  s'u7seV:^^L7. 


FOREWORD  11 

the  lofty  is  the  farthest  from  my  intention.  If  such 
a  modest  book  as  this  did  not,  on  the  whole,  con- 
tribute to  a  better  appreciation  of  the  outstanding 
few,  I  should  consider  it  a  waste  of  time  and  paper. 
Not  that  the  lofty  few  should  be  left  on  the  lonely 
heights  of  their  eminence;  storms  must  brew  around 
these  peaks  and  the  winds  of  criticism  hurl  back  and 
forth.  The  past  has  played  altogether  too  much 
havoc  with  eminence  for  us  to  feel  too  sure  of  our 
opinions.  Out  of  the  humbler  ranks,  however, 
some  day  the  rare  genius  arises;  it  is  good  to  know 
his  ancestry,  to  learn  what  men,  what  works, 
what  spiritual  attitudes,  preceded  him  and  helped 
to  shape  him  even  as  he  was  casting  off  their  spell. 
For  such  is  the  paradox  of  the  artist;  he  rebels 
against  the  very  material  he  employs. 

The  matter  of  this  book  is  largely  so  new  to  the 
English-speaking  world  that  I  have  found  it  neces- 
sary to  include  a  far  greater  proportion  of  expositive 
detail  than  I  should  have  wished.  Since  there  is 
little  use  in  discussing  values  in  the  absence  of  any- 
thing like  concrete  examples,  I  have  been  fairly 
generous  with  outlines  of  plot  and  with  biographical 
information.  In  the  case  of  no  country,  however, 
was  it  my  intention  to  speak  of  every  author  or  to 
consider,  chronologically  or  critically,  every  play  of 
the  authors  chosen.  Where  are  these  plays  being 
written,  and  under  what  circumstances?  Who  are 
the  writers?  What  are  they  trying  to  do?  How 
are  they  succeeding?  These  are  the  questions  I 
first  asked  myself  and  which  I  am  now  trying  to 
answer.  They  determine  quite  clearly  the  method 
of  treatment:  a  minimum  of  biography,  attention 
wherever  called  for  to  the  content  of  the  play,  and. 


12  FOREWORD 

most  important,  the  adumbration  of  a  critical 
opinion.  Included  in  the  critical  remarks  are  the 
opinions  of  foreign  critics  upon  the  work  under  dis- 
cussion. My  own  opinions,  which  pretend  to  no 
finality,  are  those  of  an  inquisitive,  cosmopolitan 
nature  that  deals  in  labels  with  repugnance,  as  the 
necessary  evils  they  are,  and  that  abhors  more  than 
anything  else  such  pedantries  as  cosmic  cataloguing. 
It  might  be  said,  indeed,  that  dramatic  criticism 
itself,  like  the  drama  which  it  deals  with,  is  in  a 
state  of  transition.  Certainly,  as  far  as  the  English- 
speaking  peoples  are  concerned,  the  tendency  is 
away  from  dogmatism,  irrelevant  preaching,  moral- 
izing, propaganda  of  social,  economic,  and  political 
ideals  and  what  not  else  that  obscures  the  essentially 
lyrical  nature  of  art.  For  this  reason  I  have  placed, 
before  the  chapters  upon  drama  in  various  parts  of 
the  world,  a  survey  of  recent  works  upon  dramatic 
criticism;  I  have  selected  chiefly  the  books  of  writers 
whose  attitude  enriches  my  own.  Their  common 
attribute  is  a  desire  to  escape  the  limitations  of 
academic,  traditional  thought,  to  have  done  with 
the  artificial  restrictions  that  hedge  in  discussion, 
which  should  be  as  free  as  the  art  that  it  treats. 
Yet  it  is  instructive  to  note  how  each,  in  his  own 
particular  freedom,  may  reach  conclusions  not  only 
independent  but  divergent.  For  criticism  is  an  art, 
the  critic  an  artist,  and  as  such,  an  autonomous 
being  justified  by  his  product  alone. 

If,  then,  this  book  does  not  treat  of  peaks,  there 
may  be  a  few  hills  in  it  worth  the  climb.  The 
Spanish  dramatists,  for  example,  may  not  remould 
the  society  in  which  they  flourish,  but,  on  the  other 
hand,  they  illustrate  it  and  thus  make  amends  for 


FOREWORD  13 

artistic  shortcomings  by  serving  as  quasi-social  doc- 
uments. And,  at  that,  it  is  a  question  whether  in 
an  occasional  play  Echegaray,  Galdos,  or  Bena- 
vente,  for  all  that  may  be  urged  against  them,  have 
not  risen  to  creative  vision.  Of  the  novelty-seekers, 
the  Italians  and  Germans  seem  most  active.  They 
may  be  rash,  impetuous,  at  times  ludicrous,  yet  there 
is  something  tonic  in  their  eager  restlessness.  After 
all,  it  is  easy  to  sit  by  the  ancient  fires  and  sing 
hymns  to  the  past;  but  that  past  is  always  there 
for  us  to  return  to;  it  has  been  appraised  and  re- 
appraised, and  will  be  yet  again.  Even  where  the 
deed  proves  abortive,  the  spirit  of  the  "new"  is  the 
essence  of  all  living.    Pope's  merely  shrewd  couplet, 

Be  not  the  first  by  whom  the  new  are  tried, 
Nor  yet  the  last  to  lay  the  old  aside, 

may  serve  as  the  miniature  vade  mecum  for  intel- 
lectual cowards;  to  the  adventurous  spirit  it  is  but 
a  snivelling  rhyme.  The  Yiddish  drama,  exotic  as 
it  may  appear,  exhibits  all  the  stages — in  highly 
concentrated  form — that  have  characterized  nations 
with  a  far  older  theatrical  tradition;  it  has  produced 
men  capable  of  artistic  abnegation  and  creative 
vision,  and  although  its  claims  may  easily  be  ex- 
aggerated by  devotees,  it  yields  its  own  peculiar 
contribution  to  the  general  story  of  modern  drama. 
The  same  may  be  said  of  the  drama  in  South  Amer- 
ica, where  the  stage,  for  all  practical  purposes,  was 
born  but  yesterday. 

In  dealing  with  these  milieus,  these  men  and  their 
work,  I  have  made  use  of  every  available  source  to 
throw  light  upon  the  fuller  significance  of  their 
strivings.    The  sterner  limits  of  aesthetic  criticism — 


14  FOREWORD 

I  refer  to  the  method  followed  by  Benedetto  Croce 
and  his  disciples — might  reject  certain  details  as 
superfluous  or  irrelevant,  and  I  am  not  sure  that 
such  an  attitude  would  be  unjustifiable.  This  is 
not,  however,  a  book  of  pure  criticism;  neither  is  it 
addressed  primarily  to  specialists;  the  nature  of  the 
material  calls  for  treatment  that  shall  be  at  once  bio- 
graphical, historical,  geographical,  as  well  as  critical. 
1  am  addressing  chiefly  those  seeking  more  intimate 
contact  with  the  ebb  and  flow  of  dramatic  activity, 
and  have  thus  been  discursive,  discussive,  informa- 
tive, according  to  the  relative  ignorance  prevailing 
upon  the  subjects  under  consideration. 

Some  of  the  text  has  appeared  previously  in 
books  (as  introductory  matter),  magazines,  and 
newspapers.  Though  such  text  has  in  many  cases 
been  thoroughly  revised,  I  wish  to  thank  the  editors 
of  the  various  publications  for  permission  to  make 
additional  use  of  the  material.  Among  these  are: 
the  Boston  Evening  Transcript,  the  Christian  Sci- 
ence Monitor,  the  New  York  Tribune,  the  Literary 
Review  (New  York  Evening  Post),  the  Freeman,  the 
Bookman,  the  Stratford  Journal,  and  the  Menorah 
Journal.  Among  the  publishers  of  books  to  whom  I 
am  similarly  indebted  are:  Mr.  Harrison  Hale  Schaff, 
of  Luce  and  Company,  Boston;  Brentano's;  Mr. 
B.  W.  Huebsch;  the  Stratford  Co.,  Publishers,  of 
Boston. 

I  wish,  at  the  same  time,  to  point  out  that  much 
of  the  matter  has  been  radically  altered;  one  is  not 
so  infallible  that  the  years  bring  no  change  in  out- 
look or  opinion.  Wherefore  I  would  ask  that,  in 
any  case  where  I  have  in  this  book  expressed  an 
opinion   upon   a  writer  or  subject   previously   dis- 


FOREWORD  15 

cussed  by  me  in  any  article  or  other  book,  the 
previous  expression  be  cancelled  and  the  present 
one  be  taken  as  the  more  mature.  Perhaps  not  so 
near  the  truth — wherever  that  elusive  chit  may 
dwell — but  let  us  cherish  a  while  the  illusion  that 
our  latest  opinions  are  the  best!^ 

In  order  to  preserve  a  certain  unity  in  each  di- 
vision, occasional  repetition  has  been  rendered  nec- 
essary. For  suggestions  as  to  possible  changes  in 
later  editions,  the  author  may  be  addressed  in  care 
of  the  publishers. 

Isaac  Goldberg. 

Roxbury,  Massachusetts,  1922. 

'  The  plans  for  this  book  originally  included  chapters  upon  England  and  Ireland, 
but  the  material  fast  outgrew  the  limits  set.  Happily  more  than  one  book  deals 
with  contemporary  English  dramatists.  For  Ireland  I  would  recommend  Mr. 
Ernest  A.  Boyd's  The  Contemporary  Drama  of  Ireland. 


CONTENTS 


PAGE 


Foreword  g 

Backgrounds  of  Contemporary  Dramatic 

Criticism  ig 

Spain  ^g 

Jose  Echegaray  6i 

Benito  P6rez-Gald6s  y^ 

"The  Generation  of  '98"  g^ 

Jacinto  Benavente  g6 

Italy  123 

Benelli's  New  Apostolate  132 

Giovanni  Verga  141 

Enrico  Luigi  Morselli  i4f 

Giovacchino  Forzano  if2 

Francesco  T.  Marinetti  160 
The  'Teatro  Grotesco":  Luigi  Pirandello  et  al.          173 

South  America  20c 

The"Gaucho"  211 

Florencio  Sanchez  218 

Jose  Antonio  Ramos  237 

Brazil:  Claudio  de  Souza  243 

France  247 

A  Note  on  Romain  Rolland,  Playwright  249 

Georges  Duhamel  254 


2 


17 


18  CONTENTS 


PAGE 

Germany 

267 

Expressionist  Theory 

269 

Hauptmann's  Der  fVeisse  Heiland 

279 

Walter  Hasenclever 

286 

Georg  Kaiser 

302 

Oskar  Kokoschka 

2^2 

Other  Dramatists:  Sternheim,  Kornfeld, 

von  Unruh 

Werfel,  Goering,  Toller 

318 

The  Yiddish  Drama 

327 

A  Historical  and  Critical  Survey 

329 

Leon  Kobrin 

368 

Sholom  Asch 

373 

David  Pinski 

379 

Perez  Hirschbein 

404 

New  Writers 

420 

Russia 

435 

Evreinov  and  the  Monodrama 

437 

The  United  States 

455 

Eugene  O'Neill 

457 

Susan  Glaspell 

472 

Index  482 


BACKGROUNDS  OF  CONTEMPORARY 
DRAMATIC  CRITICISM 


BACKGROUNDS  OF  CONTEMPORARY 
DRAMATIC  CRITICISM 

Human  reason?  One  might  as  well  ask  the  reason 
of  life  itself.  We  call  evil  whatever  opposes  our  good. 
We  call  madness  whatever  opposes  our  reason.  But 
it's  all  one.  .  .  .  It's  all^life^  the  fecund  mother 
of  joys  and  inexplicable  sorrows. 

— The  Doctor,  in  Benavente's  Alma  Triunfante, 
Act  III. 


"Nobody's  right — but  they  all  think  they  are 
right.  .  .  .  A  lot  they  know,"  murmurs  Liliom, 
in  Molnar's  play  of  that  name,  dying,  in  his  igno- 
rance, with  more  wisdom  upon  his  lips  than  under- 
standing in  his  heart.  He  was  speaking  of  a  larger 
world  than  criticism,  but  his  words  are  equally 
applicable  to  a  realm  he  would  never  have  com- 
prehended. There  was  once,  in  greater  numbers 
than  exist  to-day,  a  type  of  mind  that  looked  to 
criticism  for  certainty,  for  an  escape  from  feeling 
and  thought  rather  than  an  induction  into  them, 
for  a  regiment  of  names  drawn  duly  up  in  companies 
and  marshaled  according  to  rank.  That  type  is 
precisely  the  kind  that  asks  of  criticism  the  one 
thing  neither  it  nor  life  can  give  and  that  fails  to 
bring  to  it  or  to  life  the  one  thing  upon  which  they 
both  are  nourished — an  open,  restless,  inquiring 
spirit. 

21 


22         THE  DRAMA  OF  TRANSITION 

Life  itself,  except  to  those  who  harbor  implicit 
faith,  yields  no  discoverable  meaning.  The  whence, 
the  wherefore,  the  whither  are  the  sides  of  a  triangle 
far  more  eternal  than  the  passional  imbroglios  that 
weave  their  net  of  sex  upon  the  stage.  Only  in  art 
does  the  mystery  receive  a  momentary,  illusory 
solution — a  different  one  in  each  author  and  in 
each  work.  For  a  brief  while  the  impressions 
prisoned  in  book  or  play  create  an  illusion  of  order 
amid  chaos,  of  significance  amid  multiform  mean- 
inglessness.  "The  world  asks  an  ancient  query," 
runs  the  Jewish  folk  song.  And,  as  when  in  our 
childhood  games  the  Priest  of  Paris  lost  his  hat, 
some  say  this  and  some  say  that.  Yet,  to  revert 
to  the  fathomless  philosophy  of  the  folk  song,  as 
ingenuous  in  its  depth  as  was  Liliom  in  his  non- 
chalant farewell,  "the  ancient  question  still  remains." 

If,  then,  we  shall  not  look  to  art  for  certainties, 
neither  shall  we  seek  them  in  criticism.  The  pompous 
will  continue  to  emit  their  Rhadamanthine  judg- 
ments. Let  them.  The  gulls  will  go  on  drinking  the 
easy  draught;  they  will  hav^e  pocketfuls  of  jabels  for 
every  product,  and  if  the  work  do  not  fit  the  label, 
why,  give  short  shrift  to  the  work!  Let  them,  too. 
The  wiser  of  us  will  plod  along  on  our  quest  for 
beauty,  content  with  the  pleasures  of  the  road  and 
not  brooding  overmuch  upon  the  destination.  Let 
us,  therefore,  dismiss  at  the  outset  both  certainty 
and  the  literary  hierarchies  that  it  connotes.  By 
no  means  are  we  to  relinquish  the  right  to  entertain 
opinions;  but  let  us  be  modest  even  in  our  occasional 
cocksureness.  Opinions  are  only  human;  they 
change  with  us.  And  what  is  criticism  but  the  list- 
ing of  disciplined  opinions? 


CONTEMPORARY  CRITICISM  23 

Life  being  in  our  sense  of  the  word  meaningless, 
art  often  becomes  the  faith  of  the  faithless.  Art 
imposes  a  meaning  upon  things,  and  one  of  the  meas- 
ures of  the  artist  is  the  success  with  which  his  inner 
passion  fuses  the  elements  of  his  make-believe 
world  into  a  higher  reality.  If,  as  Croce  maintains, 
art  is  essentially  successful  expression,  by  that  same 
token  there  are  as  many  worlds  as  there  are  original 
individuals  to  express  and  to  appreciate.  And  since 
criticism  is  itself  an  art,  it  creates,  out  of  the  ma- 
terials with  which  it  deals,  a  world  of  its  own, — 
again  different  in  each  critic  and  in  each  of  the  critic's 
works.  The  world  of  criticism,  as  the  world  of  art, 
is  the  world  of  the  individual,  the  personality. 

II 

Few  examples  could  better  illustrate  the  in- 
evitable divergence  of  the  most  enlightened  opinion 
than  the  attitude  of  three  of  our  leading  contemporary 
critics  toward  one  of  the  most  popular  of  latter-day 
playwrights.  Storm  Jameson,  as  her  Modern  Drama 
in  Europe  reveals,  is  one  of  the  sternest  appraisers 
of  the  drama — a  veritable  Nietzsche  in  knickers, 
smashing  her  way  through  the  idols  of  the  day 
with  almost  forbidding  asperity.  Ludwig  Lewisohn, 
as  sensitive  as  she  to  the  philosophy  inherent  in 
drama  and  even  more  sensitive  to  beauty  than  she 
or  Nathan,  is  every  whit  as  exigent.  Now,  what 
becomes  of  Sir  James  Barrie  in  their  hands.'' 

This  is  Jameson's  estimate:^ 

"Mr.  Barrie  is  not  a  Romantic,  though  he  is  here 
in   their  company.     His  work  eludes  classification, 

'  Modern  Drama  in  Europe.    By  Storm  Jameson,  New  York,  1920,  pp.  211,  212. 


24         THE  DRAMA  OF  TRANSITION 

as  does  the  work  of  all  men  who  are  masters  of  their 
art.  There  is  nothing  Hke  it  in  the  whole  of  modern 
drama,  and  though  to  be  unique  is  not  to  be  great 
therefore,  few  will  be  found  to  withhold  from  Mr. 
Harrie  any  honouring  word.  Yet  is  'great*  an  ep- 
ithet of  too  little  humanity  for  his  whimsical  and 
tender  art.  There  should  be  words  to  do  it  honour, 
but  they  do  not  come  readily,  as  does  the  praise 
we  find  for  plays  that  leave  us  heart-whole.  They 
should  be  gracious  words,  and  kindly,  like  the  work 
that  waits  their  tribute,  needing  it  so  little. 

"But  the  drama  of  J.  M.  Barrie  has  other  qualities 
than  those  of  grace  and  loving  kindness,  and  other 
arts  than  the  wizardry  that  sets  men's  thoughts 
wandering  in  forgotten  places  and  their  eyes  search- 
ing for  forgotten  dreams.  There  is  pity,  infinite 
pity,  and — lest  that  become  intolerable — infinite 
courage,  defying  suffering  and  age  and  death  itself. 
Pity  and  courage  alike  have  a  fine,  keen  edge. 
There  is  nothing  sentimental  in  the  mind  that 
called  them  out,  giving  them  life  and  form — the 
form,  maybe,  of  an  awkward  boy,  or  a  'queer  old 
divert'  of  a  charwoman:  it  is  a  shrewd  mind,  quick 
to  see  the  absurdity  of  our  unconscious  posturings 
even  when  it  smiles  at  them. 

"And  if  the  true  artist  is  he  who  makes  life  finer 
and  nobler  than  it  is,  then  is  the  author  of  ^ualitx 
Street  and  The  Old  Lady  Shows  Her  Medals  indubi- 
tably an  artist,  touching  life  with  gentle  fingers, 
making  it  braver,  and  sweeter  to  our  lips.  So  that 
somewhere  among  the  hierarchy  of  those  great 
dramatists  who  took  gods  and  heroes  and  made 
them  types  of  humanity,  must  be  found  a  place — 
lowly,  if  it  is  to  please  him — for  the  dramatist  who 


CONTEMPORARY  CRITICISM  25 

took  a  charwoman  and  made  her  a  symbol  of  man's 
immortal  divinity." 

The  passage  amounts  almost  to  a  lapse  from  the 
lofty  standards  set  for  herself  in  this  most  trenchant 
of  contemporary  books  upon  the  drama.  For  a 
moment  she  seems  to  become  sentimental  with  that 
very  sentimentality  which  she  fails  to  note  in  Barrie 
— and  how  could  one  help  note  it  in  his  later  plays 
any  more  than  one  could  overlook  the  descent  of 
Maeterlinck  in  his  more  recent  productions?  Almost 
she  exemplifies  that  unconditional  surrender  which 
Professor  Phelps  prescribes  as  the  sole  possible  con- 
frontation of  Barrie. 

Nathan  occupies  here  a  middle  position.  To  him, 
Barrie  is  "the  triumph  of  sugar  over  diabetes." 

And  now  Lewisohn:^ 

"His  plays  are  commended  for  their  purity.  He 
surrounds  with  the  gentlest  pathos  and  all  the  beauty 
he  can  comprehend  a  triviality  of  soul  that  is  as 
shameful  as  one  hopes  it  rare.  Spiritual  triviality — 
we  come  very  close  to  Barrie  with  that  phrase. 
He  makes  harsh  things  sweetish  and  grave  things 
frivolous  and  noble  things  to  seem  of  small  account. 
No  wonder  he  is  popular  among  all  the  shedders 
of  easy,  comfortable  tears.  He  dramatizes  the 
cloud  in  order  to  display  its  silver  lining.  .  .  . 
Barrie's  imagination  is  as  uncontrolled  as  his  ideas 
are  feeble  and  conventional.  Yet  this  is  the  dram- 
atist whose  position  is  seriously  undebated.  This 
purveyor  of  sentimental  comedy  to  the  unthinking 
crowd  deceives  the  semi-judicious  by  moments  of 
literary  charm  and  deftness  and  mellow  grace  that 
recall  the  years  when  he  wrote  Sentimental  Tommie 

»  The  Drama  and  the  Stage.    New  York,  1922,  pages  177,  178. 


26         THE  DRAMA  OF  TRANSITION 

and  Margaret  Ogilvie.  But  those  years  are  gone. 
His  noisy  stage  successes  have  left  him  increasingly 
bare  of  scruple,  of  seriousness,  of  artistic  and  in- 
tellectual coherence.  They  have  left  him  'whim- 
sical' and  false  and  defeated  in  the  midst  of  wealth 
and  fame." 

The  humor  of  the  situation  lies  in  this:  that  the 
casual  reader  of  Jameson  and  Lewisohn  would 
almost  with  a  certainty,  coming  across  these  pas- 
sages, have  ascribed  the  first  to  Lewisohn  and  the 
second  to  Jameson.  It  is  as  if  Jameson,  in  her 
Nietzschean  demands  upon  the  drama,  had  decided 
for  a  moment  to  relent,  lest  her  requirements,  grow- 
ing over  taut,  strain  the  bonds  of  reason.  And  as 
if  Lewisohn,  sensitive  to  beauty  as  a  matrix  to  the 
vibrations  of  the  recording  needle,  felt  a  need  to 
harden  in  the  face  of  a  dangerous  substitute.  Pilate 
asked  two  questions  too  tew.  He  should  have 
added,  What  is  Goodness?  What  is  Beauty?  Then 
the  problem  <|f  art  would  have  been  posed  in  full. 
Another  eternal  triangle! 

Ill 

W^e  are  prepared,  now,  for  the  widest  differences 
of  opinion  as  to  what  constitutes  the  proper  attitude 
toward  the  drama  and  as  to  what  the  drama  itself 
may  be.  And  though  the  most  divergent  sources 
yield  similar  definitions,  even  here  the  differences 
begin  with  the  very  rise  of  the  curtain. 

What  is  a  play? 

No,  we  shall  not  go  back  to  Aristotle,  the  eternal 
precursor;  he  has  a  finger  in  every  critical  pie, 
whether  or  not  he  is  mentioned.  To  stress  our  point 
we  need  go  no  farther  than  our  own  day. 


CONTEMPORARY  CRITICISM  27 

"The  only  really  valid  definition  of  the  dramatic 
is:  Any  representation  of  imaginary  personages 
which  is  capable  of  interesting  an  average  audience 
assembled  in  a  theatre."  Thus  William  Archer,  in 
his  Playmaking:  A  Manual  of  Craftsmanship,  page 
48.  That  word  "average"  sticks  in  one's  throat;  it 
explains  Lewisohn's  half-surprise  that  a  man  "can 
translate  Ibsen  and  write  The  Green  Goddess  with 
equal  cheerfulness." 

"Good  drama  is  anything  that  interests  an  in- 
telligently emotional  group  of  persons  assembled  to- 
gether in  an  illuminated  hall.  Moliere,  wise  among 
dramatists,  said  as  much,  though  in  somewhat  more, 
and  doubtless  too,  sweeping  words.  Throughout 
the  ages  of  drama  there  will  be  always  Romanticists 
of  one  sort  or  another,  brave  and  splendid  spirits, 
who  will  have  to  free  themselves  from  the  definition 
and  limitations  imposed  upon  therp  by  the  neo- 
Bossus  and  Boileaus,  and  the  small-portion  Vol- 
taires,'Laharpes,  and  Marmontels."  Thus  Nathan,^ 
whose  "intelligently  emotional"  is  so  vast  an  im- 
provement over  Archer's  "average"  that  it  excludes 
it  implicitly  and  connotes  an  entire  attitude  toward 
all  of  life.  »^ 

With  a  similar  impatience,  Lewisohn  writes -.^ 

"Let  us  have  done,  first  of  all,  then,  with  this 
verbiage. 

"A  play  is  a  dialogue  which,  when  spoken  by 
actors  from  a  platform,  holds  the  minds  of  men 
through  its  culmination  toward  some  physical  or 
spiritual  end. 

"The  power  and  depth  of  that  sense  of  culmina- 
tion is  the  measure  of  the  play's  dramatic  life. 

>  The  Critic  and  the  Drama,  by  George  Jean  Nathan,  New  York,  1922. 
'  The  Drama  and  the  Stage.    Pages  4,  5. 


28         THE  DRAMA  OF  TRANSITION 

"Any  dialogue  that  has  dramatic  life  can  be  acted 
on  any  stage. 

"A  born  dramatist  can  write  drajiia  without  ever 
having  seen  a  theatre.     If  an   audience  refuses   to 
hear  him,  it  is  because  the  soul  of  his  work  is  alien 
I   from  that  audience's  collective  soul. 

"The  popular  playwright  is  not  he  who  under- 
stands either  the  theatre  or  the  drama  best,  but  he 
\    who  flatters  men  most  and  disturbs  them  least." 

How  far  we  have  gone  from  Mr.  Archer's  "aver- 
age" now!  Yet  all  three  definitions  carry  a  sense  of 
liberation  from  the  old,  cramping  rules.  Nor  is  that 
freedom  a  mere  relaxation  ol  discipline,  any  more 
than  is  the  newer  criticism,  with  its  refusal  to  erect 
fixed  standards,  a  renunciation  of  control.  It  is, 
on  the  contrary,  a  sterner  attitude  than  ever,  a 
more  exacting  demand  upon  self  in  the  advance  to- 
ward complete  selfhood — a  renunciation,  indeed,  of 
external  rules  that  enable  one  to  dispense  with  the 
ardors  of  thought,  since  all  things  have  their  measure 
foreordained.  This  shifting  of  criticism  from  quasi- 
objective  to  avowedly  subjective  ground,  besides 
clarifying  the  inevitably  personal  character  of  all 
criticism,  imposes  new  obligations  upon  the  critic. 
Mere  theoretical  structures  no  longer  suffice;  taste, 
in  Spingarn's'  words  synonymous  at  its  highest  with 
artistic  creation,  must  go  deeper  than  ever  before; 
far  from  applying  a  set  of  rules  from  without,  it 
must  probe  within  and  re-create  the  work  of  art. 
Far  from  settling  anything,  then,  such  an  attitude 
unsettles  everything.  It  is  part  of  a  centrifugal 
world-spirit  that  finds  expression  in  such  unrelated 
personalities  as  a  Baroja  in  Spain,  penning;  novels  of 

'  Creative  Criticism.     E^ssays  on  the  Unity  of  Genius  and  Taste.     By  J.  E. 
Spingarn.     New  York,  1917.    This  boolc  is  indispensable. 


CONTEMPORARY  CRITICISM  29 

disintegration;  a  Shestov  in  Russia,  proclaiming  the 
disunity  of  philosophy  and  declaring  all  things  pos- 
sible; a  Rodo  in  Spanish  America,  emphasizing  the 
love  of  truth  as  distinct  from  truth  itself.  (Did  not 
Nietzsche  write:  "We  should  not  let  ourselves  be 
burnt  for  our  opinions  themselves,  of  which  we  can 
never  be  quite  sure,  but  we  may  perhaps  do  so  for 
the  right  to  hold  and  change  them?"  And  has  not 
this,  sifted  through  Mencken,  become:  "If  I  knew 
what  was  true,  I'd  probably  be  willing  to  sweat  and 
strive  for  it,  and  maybe  even  to  die  for  it,  to  the 
tune  of  bugle  blasts.  But  so  far  I  have  not  found 
it"?^)  The  person  of  true  culture  thus  grows  more 
and  more  into  the  individual,  the  personality  that 
every  true  artist  contains.  Long  since  released  from 
his  tribal  loyalties  in  matters  of  politics  (let  us  hope 
so,  at  least),  he  is  thrown  upon  his  own  inner  re- 
sources, and  the  wealth  of  those  resources  determines 
the  richness  and  the  fruitfulness  of  his  perceptions 
as  well  as  of  his  response.  Criticism  is  worth  pre- 
cisely as  much  as  the  critic. 

IV 

That  even  the  spirit  of  liberation  may  tend  to 
crystallize  into  dogma  is  shown  by  the  first  of  the 
contemporary  attitudes  toward  the  drama  with 
which  we  deal.  I  call  this  the  Dukes-Jameson 
theory,  because  although  Storm  Jameson,  in  her 
recent  Modern  Drama  in  Europe ,  elaborates  the 
aristocratic,  philosophic  attitude,  it  was  stated  suc- 
cinctly some  ten  years  before  by  Ashley  Dukes,  in 
his  Modern  Dramatists.  "Tolerance  smoothes  the 
way  of  life,"  he  wrote,  "but  it  is  the  most  insidious 

'  In  Defense  of  Women,  2nd  ed.     New  York,  1922.    Page  xviii. 


30         THE  DRAMA  OF  TRANSITION 

enemy  of  art.  It  spells  compromise,  and  compro- 
mise and  criticism  cannot  be  on  speaking  terms. 
.  .  ."  The  work  of  art  is  "indiv^idual  and  inde- 
finable. It  will  be  simply  the  expression  of  a  per- 
sonality through  the  medium  of  a  craft.  If  the  craft 
fails,  the  personality  may  be  distorted,  but  if  the 
personality  fails,  the  craft  is  useless.  The  great 
need  of  the  theatre,  then,  is  not  conformity  to  this 
school  or  that,  but  the  service  of  writers  who  are  at 
once  free  spirits  and  good  workmen.  I'Vccdom  is 
their  own  possession,  but  good  workmanship  can 
be  learned  in  some  measure  from  the  masters."' 

And  who  are  Dukes'  masters? 

They  are  implicit  in  his  critical  creed:  "It  is  dog- 
matic, because  it  is  written  from  a  definite  stand- 
point, and  its  judgments  depend  upon  an  absolute 
standard  of  value.  To  write  of  any  group  of  authors, 
dramatic  or  otherwise,  without  such  a  standard,  is 
to  debase  the  coinage  of  criticism  and  to  insult  the 
artist."^  The  Dukes  standard  is  what  he  calls 
modernity.  His  modernists  are  "in  touch  with,  or 
in  advance  of,  the  thought  of  their  own  time;  .  .  . 
their  work  breaks  new  paths,  offers  new  forms  and 
modes  of  expression;  .  .  .  the  men  and  women 
they  create  do  not  merely  reflect  the  conditions 
under  which  they  live  and  the  spirit  of  their  age, 
but  are  dynamic,  developing  continually,  offering  a 
criticism  of  those  conditions,  and  so  projecting 
themselves  into  the  future  and  making  history." 
Mere  imitation  gives  way  to  selection;  description 
yields  to  interpretation.  Nor  does  modernity  depend 
upon  modern  subject-matter.  "Hugo  von  Hof- 
mannsthal,  who  has  hitherto  based  most  of  his  plays 

'  Modern  Dramatists.    By  Ashley  Dukes.    Chicago  (n.  d.). 


CONTEMPORARY  CRITICISM  31 

either  upon  the  tragic  legends  of  Greece  or  the 
Italian  Renaissance  period,  is  clearly  more  of  a 
'modern'  than  Sudermann,  who  writes  of  present- 
day  Germany."  And,  more  to  our  present  purpose, 
in  his  consideration  of  John  Galsworthy:  "It  should 
be  the  tritest  commonplace  to  say  that  no  play- 
wright can  make  great  drama  out  of  little  people."^ 
Jameson,  in  the  main,  takes  the  Dukes  standard 
and  covers  much  the  same  ground  in  greater  detail. 
Like  him,  she  pivots  modern  drama  upon  Strind- 
berg  and  Ibsen;  with  him,  she  repudiates  the  whole 
realistic  production.  "Expressed  in  another  form, 
this  distinction  between  good  and  bad  artists  be- 
comes a  question  whether  the  artist  has  given  of  a 
superabundant  vitality  to  re-create  life,  or  whether 
he  has  merely  taken  the  facts  of  life  to  manufacture 
his  work.  The  first  is  a  sign  of  strength,  the  latter 
a  sign  of  weakness.  The  first  gave  us  the  finest 
drama  of  Ibsen;  the  latter  is  giving  us  the  plays  of 
Mr.  Arnold  Bennet."  .  .  .  "The  drama  of  to- 
day is  a  drama  of  anarchy;  dramatists  have  forgotten 
how  to  imagine  finely.  They  offer  us  studies  of  little 
lives,  with  nothing  of  inspiration  in  them,  and  they 
demand  praise  for  fidelity  or  sincerity;  meaning 
thereby  failure  to  interpret  the  life  they  draw,  or 
to  create  other  than  a  bad  copy  of  what  all  can  see 
and  need  no  imagination  to  comprehend. 
It  is  Nietzsche's  great  aesthetic  service  that  he  hated 
this  anarchy  of  the  non-artistic,  teaching  that 
artists  should  not  see  things  as  they  are — they 
should  see  them  fuller,  simpler,  stronger.'  "^  .  .  . 
"Dramatically  speaking,  souls  are  not  equal.  Great 
plays  cannot  be  written  of  little  souls. "^ 

'  Modern  Dramatists.     Page   149. 
'Modern  Drama  in  Europe.  XIII — XXVI.. 
•  Modern  Drama  in  Europe.     Page  12. 


32         THE  DRAMA  OF  TRANSITION 

To  all  intents  and  purposes,  then,  Jameson  and 
Dukes  see  the  passing  drama  from  the  same  seats. 
Neither  book  is  as  well  known  in  the  United  States 
as  it  should  be,  and  it  is  safe  to  predict  for  each  a 
growing  importance  in  the  library  of  the  theatre. 
Each  is  as  stern  with  art  as  it  asks  the  artist  to  be 
with  life.  Each,  in  its  dogmatism,  possesses  almost 
the  rigidity  of  an  ethical  code,  with  Jameson  in- 
sisting upon  the  joy  born  of  power  and  all  but  reject- 
ing any  sympathy  born  of  understanding,  which  is 
itself  a  power.  Yet  toward  the  end  she  can  write, 
"To-morrow  sleeps  in  each  man's  brain,"  and 
throughout  her  valiant  volume  she  dances  in  the 
sun  of  this  life's  perpetual  discontent,  aglow  with 
the  zest  of  high  adventure. 

Less  dogmatic,  as  exclusive  of  mediocrity  but 
closer  to  the  core  of  artistic  impulse,  is  the  so-called 
Carlyle-Goethe-Croce-Spingarn  theory  to  which  Mr. 
Joel  Elias  Spingarn,  in  a  volume  important  inversely 
to  its  modest  proportions,  first  called  serious  atten- 
tion. The  battle  between  the  objectiv^e,  dogmatic 
critic  and  the  impressionist  is  as  "old  as  the  earliest 
reflection  on  the  subject  of  poetry.  Modern  litera- 
ture begins  with  the  same  doubts,  the  same  quarrel. 
In  the  sixteenth  century  the  Italians  were  formulat- 
ing that  classical  code  which  imposed  itself  on  Europe 
for  two  centuries,  and  which,  even  in  our  generation, 
Brunetiere  has  merely  disguised  under  the  trappings 
of  natural  science.  They  evolved  the  dramatic 
unities,^  and  all  those  rules  which  Pope  imagined  to 
be  'Nature  still  but  Nature  methodized.'     But  at 

'  Inasmuch  as  this  is  not  a  book  for  specialists,  I  may  be  pardoned  the  re- 
mark that  Aristotle  did  not  erect  the  so-called  three  unities,  which,  as  Spingarn 
states,  were  later  evolved.  The  simple  fact  needs  frequent  restatement,  for  one 
is  constantly  meeting,  in  the  most  up-to-date  works,  references  to  Aristotle  as  the 
originator  of  the  famous  trio  of  unities.     "It  is  difficult  to  believe,"  writes  Gilbert 


CONTEMPORARY  CRITICISM  33 

the  very  moment  when  their  spokesman  Scaliger 
was  saying  that  'Aristotle  is  our  perpetual  emperor, 
the  perpetual  dictator  of  the  fine  arts,'  another 
Italian,  Pietro  Aretino,  was  insisting  that  there  is  no 
rule  except  the  whim  of  genius  and  no  standard  of 
judgment  beyond  individual  taste."^ 

To  the  Germans  of  the  epoch  stretching  from 
Herder  to  Hegel  we  owe  the  enunciation  of  the  doc- 
trine of  art  as  expression.  Carlyle  interpreted  it  to 
the  English.  "  'There  is  a  destructive  and  a  creative 
or  constructive  criticism,'  said  Goethe;  the  first 
measures  and  tests  literature  according  to  mechan- 
ical standards,  the  second  answers  the  fundamental 
questions:  'What  has  the  writer  proposed  to  himself 
to  do?  and  How  far  has  he  succeeded  in  carrying 
out  his  own  plan?'  "  Carlyle,  in  his  essay  on  Goethe, 
almost  uses  Goethe's  own  words  when  he  says  that 
the  critic's  first  and  foremost  duty  is  to  make  plain 
to  himself  "what  the  poet's  aim  really  and  truly  was, 
how  the  task  he  has  to  do  stood  before  his  eye,  and 
how  far,  with  such  materials  as  were  afforded  him, 
he  has  fulfilled  it." 

Such  a  conception  of  criticism  involves  a  radical 
revision  of  views.  Rules,  as  rules,  disappear.  Since 
each  work  of  art  is  a  law  unto  itself,  genres^  repre- 
senting an  artificial  system  of  cataloguing,  follow  the 
rules  into  oblivion.  Style,  in  the  sense  of  rhetorical 
embellishment,  goes  with  them,  for  the  work  of  art 
is  an  indivisible  entity.  Moral  judgment  of  literature 
becomes  an  anachronism.     "To  say  that  poetry  is 

Norwood  in  his  Greek  Tragedy  (London,  1920,  note  1,  page  42),  "that  Aristotle 
never  mentions  the  'Three  Unities.'  On  the  Unity  of  Action  he  has,  of  course, 
much  to  say;  the  Unity  of  Time  is  dismissed  in  one  casual  sentence.  As  to  the 
Unity  of  Place  there  is  not  a  word.  It  is  signally  violated  in  the  Euinenides  and 
the  Ajax." 

1  Creative  Criticism.    See  the  entire  first  lecture,  pages  3-44. 
3 


34         THE  DRAMA  OF  TRANSITION 

moral  or  immoral  is  as  meaningless  as  to  say  that 
an  equilateral  triangle  is  moral  and  an  isosceles 
triangle  immoral,  or  to  speak  of  the  immorality  of  a 
musical  chord  or  a  Gothic  arch."  .  .  .  "No 
critic  of  authority  now  tests  literature  by  the  stand- 
ards of  ethics." 

It  follows,  from  the  Crocean  conception  of  art  as 
successful  expression,  that  technique  cannot  be  sep- 
arate from  art  any  more  than  can  style — that  the 
epoch  and  the  environment  of  an  artist's  labors  are 
of  interest  as  history  or  sociology,  but  not  as  art. 
These  are  assumed;  the  central  interest  is  trans- 
ferred to  what  the  poet  has  done  with  his  material. 
\f  genres  disappear,  so  must  the  conception  of  the 
evolution  of  literature  and  of  the  origins  of  art, 
"for  art  has  no  origin  separate  from  man's  life." 

I  am  not  asking  the  reader  to  accept  Qroce's 
philosophy;  I  am  trying  to  prepare  him  for  an  appre- 
ciation of  the  Croce-Spingarn  attitude  toward  the 
drama.  "We  have  done,"  says  Spingarn,  "with  the 
confusion  between  the  drama  and  the  theatre  which 
has  permeated  criticism  for  over  half  a  century. 
The  theory  that  the  drama  is  not  a  creative  art, 
but  a  mere  product  of  the  physical  exigencies  of  the 
theatre,  is  as  old  as  the  sixteenth  century.  An 
Italian  scholar  of  that  age  was  the  first  to  maintain 
that  plays  are  intended  to  be  acted  on  a  stage,  under 
certain  restricted  physical  conditions,  and  before  a 
large  and  heterogeneous  crowd.  Dramatic  perform- 
ance has  developed  out  of  these  conditions,  and  the 
test  of  its  excellence  is  therefore  the  pleasure  it 
gives  to  the  mixed  audience  that  supports  it.  This 
idea  was  taken  hold  of  by  some  of  the  German 
romanticists  for  the  purpose  of  justifying  the  Shake- 


CONTEMPORARY  CRITICISM  35 

spearean  drama  in  its  apparent  divergence  from  the 
classical  'rules.'  Shakespeare  cannot  be  judged  by 
the  rules  of  the  Greek  theatre  (so  ran  their  argument), 
for  the  drama  is  an  inevitable  product  of  theatrical 
conditions.  These  conditions  in  Elizabethan  Eng- 
land were  not  the  same  as  those  of  Pereclean  Athens; 
and  it  is  therefore  absurd  to  judge  Shakespeare's 
practice  by  that  of  Sophocles.  Here,  at  least,  the 
idea  helped  to  bring  Shakespeare  home  to  many 
new  hearts  by  ridding  the  age  of  mistaken  preju- 
dices, and  served  a  useful  purpose,  as  a  specious 
argument  may  persuade  men  to  contribute  to  a 
noble  work,  or  a  mad  fanatic  may  rid  the  world  of 
a  tyrant.  But  with  this  achievement  its  usefulness 
but  not  its  life  was  ended.  It  has  been  developed 
into  a  system  and  become  a  dogma  of  dramatic 
critics;  it  is  our  contemporary  equivalent  for  the 
'ru.les'  of  seventeenth-century  pedantry.  As  a  mat- 
ter of  fact,  the  dl-amatic  artist  is  to  be  judged  by 
no  other  standard  than  that  applied  to  any  other 
creative  artist:  What  has  he  tried  to  express,  and 
how  has  he  expressed  it.?  It  is  true  that  the  theatre 
is  not  only  an  art  but  a  business,  and  the  so-called 
'success'  of  a  play  is  of  vital  interest  to  the  theatre 
in  so  far  as  it  is  a  commercial  undertaking.  'The 
success  may  justify  the  playwright,'  said  an  old 
French  critic,  'but  it  may  not  be  so  easy  to  justify 
the  success.'  The  test  of  'success'  is  an  economic 
test,  and  concerns  not  art  or  the  criticism  of  art, 
but  political  economy.  Valuable  contributions  to 
economic  and  social  history  have  been  made  by 
students  who  have  investigated  the  changing  con- 
ditions of  the  theatre  and  the  vicissitudes  of  taste 
on  the  part  of  theatrical  audiences;  but  these  have 


36         THE  DRAMA  OF  TRANSITION 

the  same  relation  to  criticism  and  to  the  drama  as 
art  that  a  history  of  the  pubHsher's  trade  and  its 
influence  on  the  personal  fortunes  of  poets  would 
bear  to  the  history  of  poetry." 

This  severe  scrutiny  of  all  extraneous  elements  is 
the  more  important  since  here,  in  the  United  States, 
technique  has  long  been  a  word  to  conjure  with, 
and  of  late  there  has  been  a  tendency  to  stress  the 
appurtenances  of  drama — the  scenery,  the  lighting, 
the  stage  mechanism—  to  the  hurt  of  the  creative 
spectator.  Bound  up  with  this,  too,  is  another 
problem  of  criticism:  the  relation  of  the  printed  to 
the  acted  play. 

"The  first  to  challenge  this  theory  of  the  drama" 
(i.  e.,  the  so-called  "closet  drama")  "was  a  scholar 
and  critic  of  the  Renaissance,  Lodovico  Castelvetro, 
who  published  an  Italian  version  of  Aristotle's 
Poetics  in  1570.  .  .  .  Castelvetro  certainly  takes 
issue  with  Aristotle  on  the  question  whether  the 
drama  exhibits  its  real  power  in  the  study  or  in  the 
theatre.  'Non  6  vero  quello  che  Aristotele  dice,'  he 
says:  it  simply  is  not  true,  what  Aristotle  says,  that 
the  value  of  a  play  can  be  discovered  by  reading  in 
the  same  way  as  by  theatrical  representation,  for 
the  reason  that  a  few  highly  gifted  and  imaginative 
men  might  be  able  to  judge  a  play  in  this  way, 
whereas  everyone,  the  gifted  and  ignorant  alike, 
can  follow  and  appreciate  a  play  when  it  is  acted. 
.  .  .  In  order  to  understand  what  the  drama  is, 
and  what  is  the  peculiar  pleasure  that  it  affords  to 
men,  we  must  examine  the  conditions  of  the  physical 
theatre  and  realize  what  is  to  be  found  there.  The 
fact  that  the  drama  is  intended  for  the  stage,  that 


CONTEMPORARY  CRITICISM  37 

it  is  to  be  acted,  must  form  the  basis  of  every  true 
theory  of  tragedy  or  comedy."^ 

This  prepares  us  for  Diderot's  exaltation  of  the 
actor  as  the  real  creator  of  the  play,  and  to  his  theory 
of  what  we  now  call  the  psychology  of  the  crowd, 
whicli,  as  Spingarn  points  out,  had  been  foreshadowed 
in  Bacon's  De  Augmentis^  as  well  as  by  Castelvetro 
himself.  Lessing,  in  his  Hamburgische  Dramaturgic^ 
returns  to  the  Aristotelian  conception.  "Indeed,  he 
forestalls  Lamb's  theory  that  a  great  play  cannot  be 
properly  acted  at  all:  'A  masterpiece  is  rarely  as 
well  represented  as  it  is  written;  mediocrity  always 
fares  better  with  the  actors.'  " 

The  circle  of  contradictions  is  complete.  Here 
we  have  Lewisohn  saying  that  a  naturally  gifted 
dramatist  need  never  see  the  inside  of  a  theatre; 
and  here  is  Lamb,  supported  by  Spingarn,  averring 
that  the  audience  may  remain  away  as  well.  The 
exploitation  of  crowd-psychology  I  am  ready  to 
dismiss  without  recall.  It  is  for  the  most  part  a 
concession  to  the  lower  tastes  of  the  mob,  which 
can  wear  frock  coats  as  well  as  smocks.  No  one 
hears  anything  about  crowd  psychology  when  a 
poet  reads  his  verses  in  a  public  hall;  everyone  con- 
demns the  orator  who  makes  his  cheap  appeal  to 
this  very  characteristic  of  crowds.     That  appeal  is 

1  Spingarn,  Creative  Criticism.  Pages  47-96,  lecture  on  Dramatic  Criticism  and 
The  Theatre.  ^     . 

The  best-known  contemporary  defender  of  the  Castelvetro  attitude  m  this 
country  is  Brander  Matthews.  In  his  essay  on  Francisque  Sarcey  {Studies  on  the 
Stage)  he  savs:  "A  play  is  written  not  to  be  read,  primarily,  but  to  be  acted. 
M.  Coquelin  has  recently  pointed  out  that  if  Shakespeare  and  Moliere  .  .  . 
were  both  careless  as  to  the  printing  of  their  plays,  it  was  because  they  both  knew 
that  these  plays  were  written  for  the  theatre,  and  that  only  in  the  theatre  could 
they  be  judged  properly.  Seen  by  the  light  of  the  lamps,  a  play  has  quite  another 
complexion  from  what  it  bears  in  the  library.  Passages  pale  and  dull  .  .  . 
when  read  coldly  by  the  eyes,  are  lighted  up  by  the  inner  fire  of  passion  when 
presented  in  the  theatre;  and  the  solid  structure  of  the  action,  without  which  a 
drama  is  naught,  may  stand  forth  in  bolder  relief  on  the  stage." 


L  a' 


38         THE  DRAMA  OF  TRANSITION 

just  as  cheap  when  made  in  an  auditorium  that 
houses  a  drama.  Back  of  every  work  of  art,  more 
important  than  the  nation  or  the  people  that  gave 
it  birth,  stands  the  individual,  the  personality. 
Though  as  a  human  being  he  may  form  part  of  the 
crowd,  as  an  artist  he  is  its  enemy,  or  at  least  inde- 
pendent of  its  dictates.  The  crowd,  indeed,  is  the 
very  symbol  of  that  imperfect  reality  which  the 
artist  would  not  so  much  escape  as  make  over. 
Though  the  product  be  read  or  heard  or  witnessed 
by  the  thousands,  it  is  primarily  a  bridge  of  expres- 
sion leading  from  one  to  one.  Art  being,  then,  the 
communication  of  significant  personality,  the  ma- 
terial and  the  milieu  and  the  manner  are  secondary; 
better  still,  they  are  incidental  attributes.  They 
are  not  the  essence  of  art,  which  lies  in  a  personal 
permutation  of  those  elements  into  an  organic 
whole.  When  the  artist's  work  finds  an  under- 
standing goal,  the  circuit  of  personality  is  complete. 
Art  begins  and  ends  in  the  individual.  For  it,  the 
"crowd"  simply  does  not  exist. 

And,  from  the  standpoint  of  Croce  and  Spingarn, 
representing  aesthetic  criticism,  "the  theatre  simply 
does  not  exist."  To  such  criticism,  "a  theatre  means 
only  the  appearance  at  any  one  time  or  in  any  one 
country,  as  Croce  puts  it,  of  a  'series  of  artistic 
souls.'  When  these  artistic  souls  appear  theatres 
wiy  spring  up  like  mushrooms  to  house  them,  and 
the  humblest  garret  will  serve  as  an  eyrie  for  their 
art.  But  all  these  external  conditions  are  merely 
dead  material  which  has  no  aesthetic  significance 
outside  the  poet's  soul;  and  only  in  the  poet's  art 
should  we  seek  to  find  them."  .  .  .  "To  say, 
therefore,  that  playwrights  write  for  the  stage,  that 


CONTEMPORARY  CRITICISM  39 

poets  write  for  money,  that  painters  paint  to  be 
'hung,'  is  to  confuse  mere  stimulus  with  creative 
impulse."  .  .  .  "For  the  true  dramatic  critic  will  trans- 
fer his  interest  from  the  drama  itself  to  the  'laws  of 
the  theatre'  or  the  'conditions  of  the  theatre'  only 
when  the  lover  studies  the  'laws  of  love'  and  the 
'conditions  of  love'  instead  of  the  lady's  beauty  and 
his  own  souL" 

The  Croce-Spingarn  criterion  of  pure  aesthetics  is 
a  severe  discipline.  Although,  as  a  strong  person- 
ality and  a  merry  impressionist,  George  Jean  Nathan 
accepts  many  of  its  implications,  he  rebels  against 
the  acceptance  of  any  one  theory.  "There  are  as 
many  sound  and  apt  species  of  criticism  as  there 
are  works  to  be  criticized.  To  say  that  art  must  be 
criticized  only  after  this  formula  or  after  that  is  to 
say  that  art  must  be  contrived  only  out  of  this 
formula  or  out  of  that.  As  every  work  of  art  is  an 
entity,  a  thing  in  itself,  so  is  every  piece  of  criticism  ^ 
an  entity,  a  thing  in  itself.  That  Thus  Spake  Zar- 
athustra  must  inevitably  be  criticized  by  the  canons 
of  the  identical  'theory'  with  which  one  criticizes 
Tristan  and  Isolde  is  surely  difficult  reasoning. 

"To  the  Goethe-Carlyle  doctrine  that  the  critic's 
duty  lies  alone  in  discerning  the  artist's  aim,  his 
point  of  view,  and,  finally,  his  execution  of  the  task 
before  him,  it  is  easy  enough  to  subscribe,  but 
certainly  this  is  not  a  'theory'  of  criticism  so  much 
as  it  is  the  foundation  for  a  theory.  To  advance  it 
as  a  theory,  full-grown,  full-fledged  and  flapping, 
as  it  has  been  advanced  by  the  Italian  Croce  and 
his  admirers,  is  to  publish  the  preface  to  a  book 
without  the  book  itself.  Accepted  as  a  theory 
complete  in  itself,  it  fails  by  virtue  of  its  several 


40         THE  DRAMA  OF  TRANSITION 

undeveloped  intrinsic  problems,  chief  among  which 
is  its  neglect  to  consider  the  undeniable  fact  that, 
though  each  work  of  art  is  indubitably  an  entity 
and  so  to  be  considered,  there  is  yet  in  creative  art 
what  may  be  termed  an  aesthetic  genealogy  that 
bears  heavily  upon  comprehensive  criticism  and  that 
renders  the  artist's  aim,  his  point  of  view,  and  his 
execution  of  the  task  before  him  susceptible  to  a 
criticism  predicated  in  a  measure  upon  the  work  of 
the  sound  artist  wh<j  has  just  preceded  him. 

"The  Goethe-Carlyle  hypothesis  is  a  little  too 
liberal.  It  calls  for  qualifications.  It  gives  the 
artist  too  much  ground,  and  the  critic  too  little. 
To  discern  the  artist's  aim,  to  discern  the  artist's 
point  of  view,  are  phrases  that  require  an  amount 
of  plumbing  and  not  a  few  footnotes.  It  is  entirely 
possible,  for  example,  that  the  immediate  point  of 
view  of  an  artist  may  be  faulty,  yet  the  execution 
of  his  immediate  task  exceedingly  fine.  If  carefully 
planned  triumph  in  art  is  an  entity,  so  also  may  be 
undesigned  triumph.  .  .  .  All  things  considered, 
it  were  perhaps  better  that  the  critical  theory  under 
discussion,  il  it  be  accepted  at  all,  be  turned  end 
foremost:  that  the  artist's  execution  of  the  task 
before  him  be  considered  either  apart  from  his  aim 
and  point  of  view,  or  that  it  be  considered  first,  and 
then — with  not  too  much  insistence  upon  them — 
his  point  of  view  and  his  aim.  ...  In  its  very 
effort  to  avoid  pigeon-holing,  the  Goethe-Carlyle 
theory  pigeon-holes  itself.  .  .  .  That  there  may 
not  be  contradictions  in  the  contentions  here  set 
forth  I  am  not  sure.  But  I  advance  no  fixed,  definite 
theory  of  my  own;  I  advance  merely  contradictions 
of  certain  of  the  phases  of  theories  held  by  others. 


CONTEMPORARY  CRITICISM  41 

and  contradictions  are  ever  in  the  habit  of  begetting 
contradictions.  .  .  .  The  Goethe-Carlyle  theory, 
properly  rigid  and  unyielding  so  far  as  emotional 
groundlings  are  concerned,  may,  I  believe,  at  times 
safely  be  chucked  under  the  chin  and  offered  a  com- 
munication of  gipsy  ardour  by  the  critic  whose 
emotions  are  the  residuum  of  trial,  test,  and  ex- 
perience."^ 

Nathan,  whose  views  upon  the  crowd  in  the  theatre 
coincide  quite  with  those  of  Spingarn  and  the  Cro- 
ceans,  takes  an  opposite  stand  upon  the  relation 
between  the  printed  play  and  the  acted.  For  once, 
at  least,  he  is  in  definite  agreement  with  Brander 
Matthews,  thus  proving  that  criticism,  like  politics, 
betimes  makes  strange  bedfellows.  "To  hold  that 
the  drama  as  an  art  may  achieve  its  highest  end 
read  by  the  individual  and  not  acted  in  the  theatre, 
is  to  hold  that  music  as  an  art  may  achieve  its 
highest  end  played  by  but  one  instrument  and  not 
by  an  orchestra.  The  theatre  is  the  drama's  or- 
chestra. Upon  the  wood  of  its  boards  and  the  wind 
of  its  puppets  is  the  melody  of  drama  in  all  its  full 
richness  sounded.  "^ 

Something  valid  there  seems  in  Nathan's  attitude 
toward  the  Goethe-Carlyle  theory  that  has  been 
elaborated  into  a  rather  formidable  apparatus  by 
Croce.  More  valid  than  ever,  indeed,  when  we  con- 
front some  of  the  Italian's  followers,  who  become 
more  Crocean  than  Croce.  Here  is  Mr.  Ainslie,  for 
example,  in  the  preface  to  his  translation  of  AriostOy 
Shakespeare^  and  Corneille^  asserting  that  "Croce's 
theory  of  the  independence  and  autonomy  of  the 

■  George  Jean  Nathan.  The  Critic  and  the  Drama,  chapter  on  ^Esthetic  Juris- 
prudence, pages  3-26. 

'  The  Critic  and  The  Drama.    Chapter  on  The  Place  of  the  Theater,  pages  65-66. 


42         THE  DRAMA  OF  TRANSITION 

aesthetic  fact,  which  is  intuition-expressiori,  and  of 
the  essentially  lyrical  character  of  all  art,  is  the  only 
one  that  completely  and  satisfactorily  explains  the 
problem  of  poetry  and  the  fine  arts."  But  Croce 
himself,  in  his  most  recent  work,  gives  the  best 
rmswer  to  such  self-destructive  supcrhitivity  and  to 
Nathan's  impatience  with  too  tightly  ringed  theory. 
Commenting  upon  the  word  "illogica,"  he  writes 
that  it  means  "not  entirely  harmonized,"  and  ap- 
plies to  the  system  of  every  man  and  every  phil- 
osopher, who  always  possesses  some  aspect  not  har- 
monized and  not  logical.  This  aspect,  he  goes  on, 
is  precisely  the  source  whence  springs  the  new 
thought  or  the  so-called  new  progress.*^  It  is  in- 
dicative that  Croce,  in  this  very  passage  that  treats 
of  the  illogicality  of  Dante's  system,  parenthetically 
applies  the  observation  to  the  systems  of  all  men. 
Artistic  personality  thus  is  a  triumph  over  logic, 
and  Nathan's  numerous  contradictions,  to  add  yet 
another  to  his  list,  may  not  artistically  be  con- 
tradicted. 

We  are  not  yet  done,  however,  with  the  varied 
attitudes  of  our  divergent  free  spirits.  For,  just  as 
Lewisohn  and  Spingarn  seem  to  flout  the  theatre 
and  the  audience,  so  now  comes  a  young  Scotchman 
and  suggests  that  perhaps  criticism  itself  is  false  at 
the  very  core. 

"What,"  asks  Edwin  Muir,  "if  all  the  assump- 
tions on  which  we  have  thus  far  judged  art  should 
be — erroneous?  What  if  every  system  of  aesthetics 
and  every  criticism  should  be,  not  merely  wrong 
here  and  there,  but,  by  their  very  existence,  the 
standing,  immemorial  misunderstanding  of  art.**     In 

'  La  Poesia  di  Dante.     Benedetto  Croce.     Ban,  1921,  page  55. 


CONTEMPORARY  CRITICISM  43 

short,  what  if  questions  regarding  the  function  and 
the  'meaning'  of  art  simply  should  not  be  asked  at 
all,  and,  in  any  case,  should  never  be  answered? 
These  inquiries  have  drawn  forth  and  written  this 
edifying  essay. ^ 

"My  thesis  is  that  art  can  be  comprehended  on  one 
hypothesis  only,  that  this  hypothesis  concerns  the 
universe,  and  that,  in  the  history  of  the  universe, 
it  has  very  seldom  been  consciously  held.  The  hun- 
dred and  one  philosophers  who  have  constructed 
theories  of  art  have  certainly  not  held  it:  their  sys- 
tems of  aesthetics  are  to  be  found,  each  killed  with 
an  appropriate  comment,  in  the  terrifying  appendix 
to  Signor  Croce's  book.  Signor  Croce  made  only 
one  error  in  that  almost  infallible  work:  he  should 
finally,  as  an  exercise  in  impartiality,  have  sent  his 
own  theory  to  the  guillotine  and  have  become  his 
own  executioner.  But  unfortunately  he  could  not 
refute  himself."^ 

That  hypothesis  Muir  states  in  the  following 
terms:  "Art  delights  us  precisely  because  it  takes 
us  out  of  the  realm  of  duty,  of  reason,  and  of  neces- 
sity. It  does  not  moralize  or  humanize  us  nor  re- 
mind us  of  eternal  justice.  It  carries  us  into  a 
world  which  is  neither  necessary  nor  necessitated, 
but  perfectly  arbitrary  and  free,  and  gives  us  freely 
something  inconceivably  rich  and  magical,  not  be- 
cause we  deserve  it  nor  even  because  we  'need'  it, 
but  simply  as  a  final  golden  superfluous  drop  to 
our  filled  cup.     Delight  is  the  feeling  which  we  ex- 

'  See  the  two  articles  on  The  Truth  About  Art  in  The  Freeman  for  February 
15  and  March  15,  1922. 

»  Croce  could  not  very  well  commit  philosophic  suicide,  of  course;  but  the 
reference  to  his  casual  passage  in  the  book  on  Dante,  which  I  give  several  par- 
agraphs back,  reveals  him  in  a  fairly  human,  even  humble,  attitude.  That  one 
reference  indeed  might  be  made  the  basis  for  a  negation  of  all  philosophy. 


44         THE  DRAMA  OF  TRANSITION 

perience  when  we  receive  something  great  or  beau- 
tiful without  needing  it.  And  art  gives  us  this 
feeling.  .  .  .  The  plainest  truth  about  art  is  that 
it  is  superfluous,  and  springs  out  of  superfluity; 
to  give  it  a  use  one  has  to  strain  and  falsify  not  only 
art,  but  the  terms  one  uses.  .  .  .  In  the  end,  the 
presence  in  the  universe  of  superfluity  is  only  made 
possible  by  setting  at  the  ultimate  bounds  of  ex- 
istence chance,  irrationality,  folly.  Then  all  things 
become,  as  tliey  arc,  possible.*  Then  freedom  is 
gained  perhaps  for  the  first  time.  This  choice,  once 
it  is  made,  commits  us  to  several  assumptions. 
For  instance,  that  there  is  no  connexion  whatever 
between  a  thing's  necessity — to  the  'world'  or  to 
anything  else—  and  its  right  to  exist.  Everything 
exists  as  a  perfectly  unnecessary  thing:  we  ourselves, 
philosophies,  literatures,  and  States,  as  well  as 
butterflies  and  planets.  It  is  only  after  they  have 
come  into  existence  that  we  make  them  into  neces- 
saries. We  are  not  entitled  to  condemn  anything 
because  it  has  no  function;  on  the  contrary,  to  be 
without  a  function  is  to  be  free,  to  be  rich.  The 
greatest  things  have  been  done  by  men  who  have 
had  no  function;  for  to  do  a  thing  freely  is  to  be 
great." 

From  which  premises  Mr.  Muir  deduces  the  su- 
perfluity of  that  other  art,  criticism.  But  not  on 
that  account  should  it  be  abolished,  any  more  than 
art  itself. 

"From  all  this  it  follows — that  criticism  should  be 
abolished.^  On  the  contrary.  It  has  the  same  right 
to  exist  as  every  other  superfluous  thing.  Its  justi- 
fication is  that  it  fulfills  no  use;  that  it  is,  like  art, 

'  So,  too,  the  Russian  epigrammatic  philosopher  Leo  Shcstov,  one  of  whose 
books  is  actually  named  in  its  English  Version,  All  Things  Are  Possible. 


CONTEMPORARY  CRITICISM  45 

expression.  But  if  a  thing  is  not  useful  it  cannot  be 
important?  This  is  the  great  orthodox  heresy  about 
the  universe  which  malces  it  such  a  dull  place  to 
live  in.  The  superfluous  things  are  the  important 
things,  the  justification  of  life,  the  saving  grace 
whereby  the  useful  and  the  necessary  are  redeemed. 
For  life  also  is  finally  expression,  and  not  task  nor 
instrument." 

Mr,  Muir,  then,  has  been  playing  with  paradox. 
In  the  very  act  of  denying  art  and  criticism  he 
creates  them.  He  is  like  the  vaudevillian  who  ex- 
claims, "Women!  women!  We  can't  get  along  with 
them  and  we  can't  get  along  without  them!"  Now, 
that  vaudevillian  has  merely  been  expressing  a 
fundamentally  useless  and  only  half-serious  rebellion 
against  an  indispensable  half  of  life.  So,  too,  Muir, 
who  cannot  get  along  with  criticism  and  cannot  get 
along  without  it. 

V 

We  agreed,  at  the  outset,  not  to  look  to  criticism 
for  certainty;  surely  we  have  not  at  any  moment 
here  been  in  danger  of  encountering  it.  But,  on 
the  other  hand,  we  have  encountered  something  far 
more  precious:  a  high  sense  of  adventure,  of  per- 
sonal freedom,  intellectual  courage.  One  thing 
should,  moreover,  be  definitely  impressed  before 
abandoning  this  survey:  that  this  progression  away 
from  fixed  standards  not  only  does  not  shirk  the 
burdens  of  intellectual  effort,  but  adds  to  them. 
It  is  not  that  bugaboo  of  irresponsibility  and  license 
as  opposed  to  responsible  liberty.  There  is  nothing 
more  intellectually  degrading  than  a  supine  adher- 
ence to  literary  authority;  it  numbs  and  even  de- 
stroys the  personality.     There  is  nothing  more  ex- 


46         THE  DRAMA  OF  TRANSITION 

hilarating,  on  the  other  hand,  than  the  freedom  that 
comes  with  true  selfhood;  far  from  shirking,  even 
in  the  moral  sense,  it  seeks  new  responsibilities  for 
the  sheer  joy  of  vanquishing  them.  It  is  the  eternal 
spirit  of  nonconformity,  conforming  only  to  its  own 
true  self. 

From  these  general  considerations  we  come  now 
to  concerns  more  immediate,  if  less  related,  to  pure 
criticism.  In  a  book  aiming  to  throw  light  upon  the 
current  drama  in  a  number  oi  countries  the  question 
of  nationalism  naturally  arises,  in  an  era  of  psycho- 
analysis, during  which  the  shadow  (and  sunshine) 
of  Freud  is  cast  upon  the  novel,  the  influence  of 
that  noted  investigator  upon  the  drama  is  of  his- 
torical and  social  interest.  In  an  epoch  that  has, 
in  our  own  country,  witnessed  the  resurgence  of 
Puritanism,  the  ancient  killjoy  of  censorship  enters 
a  second  childhood  and  compels  the  artist  to  take 
up  the  cudgels  anew.  I  will  deal  with  these  matters 
summarily,  even  at  the  risk  of  appearing  dogmatic. 
And  if  a  flash  of  temper  gleam  forth  it  is  not  the 
lesser  part  of  social  criticism — as  of  any  other 
variety — to  be  human  as  well  as  superior. 

Nationalism  in  Art.  In  the  sense  of  propaganda, 
nationalism  has  no  more  place  in  art  than  morality 
or  any  other  set  of  rules.  Neither,  for  that  matter, 
has  internationality.  It  is  an  illusion,  for  example, 
that  advanced  drama  must  follow  economics  in 
theme  and  make  the  proletariat  its  hero.  In  the 
artistic  sense,  the  Greek  dramas  are  more  con- 
temporaneous with  us  than  many  a  self-conscious 
proletarian  drama  that  collapses  from  sheer  hollow- 
ness.  All  these  attitudes,  however,  may  serve  as 
the   passional    centre    from    which    radiates    a    full 


CONTEMPORARY  CRITICISM  47 

circle  of  human  significance.  Hauptmann's  Weavers^ 
incidentally,  makes  good  propaganda  for  the  down- 
trodden; but  that  is  not  the  core  of  the  play,  which 
is  revelatory  and  not  hortatory.  So,  too,  if  Gals- 
worthy's Strife  attracts  the  radical  element,  it  had 
its  origin  in  something  deeper  than  a  desire  to  sup- 
port the  working  class.  Indeed,  it  is  common  ex- 
perience, at  every  performance  of  the  play,  to  hear 
the  members  of  the  audience  take  sides,  particularly 
during  the  meeting  of  the  strikers'  representatives 
with  the  company's  board  of  directors.  A  play  that 
takes  sides,  however,  may  be  excellent  thought, 
admirable  humanity,  and  what  not  else,  but  as  a 
work  of  art  (and  that  is  what  we  are  now  interested 
in)  it  is  as  dishonest  as  a  game  with  marked  cards 
or  with  loaded  dice.  So,  too,  the  "national"  play. 
It  may  be  fine  patriotism  or  w"hatever  you  like,  but 
it  is  not  art,  unless  that  nationalism  or  internation- 
alism is  at  the  center,  not  at  the  periphery,  of  the 
action, — unless  these  elements  are  ingredients  of  the 
inspiration  (if  we  may  talk  of  art  in  terms  of  the 
cook  book),  and  not  the  preordained  end  toward 
which  all  events  are  willy-nilly  to  be  directed.  If 
art  is  not  a  pulpit,  neither  is  it  a  recruiting  station. 
The  dramatist,  moreover,  who  writes  a  play  as 
a  conscious  citizen  of  a  nation  to  which  he  ascribes 
certain  "national"  characteristics  nms  the  risk  of 
vitiating  his  work  through  false  assumptions,  even 
as  the  critic  who  interprets  that  play  in  the  light  of 
those  same  assumptions.  We  take  it  so  easily  for 
granted  that  every  German  must  write  ponderously, 
forgetting  the  winged  words  of  Nietzsche;  that  every 
Spaniard  must  wallow  in  blood  spilt  at  the  behest 
of  the  point  of  honor,  forgetting  a  Benavente  who 


48        ^THE  DRAMA  OF  TRANSITION 

flounts  all  the  canons  of  home-made  and  imported 
dramaturgy;  that  Russians  must  be  morbid,  what 
though  Gogol's  Revizor  punctures  the  theory.  This 
is  not  to  say  that  national  characteristics  do  not 
exist,  or  that  they  lack  importance  in  art.  But 
just  in  proportion  as  the  artist  accepts  them  un- 
questioningly,  and  the  critic,  too,  he  surrenders  part 
of  that  free  personality  which  is  the  sign  and  seal 
of  the  creative  genius. 

In  literature,  nationalism  is  a  term  that  requires 
extensive  modification  even  in  the  minds  of  scholars, 
who  forget  the  immense  importance  of  that  cross- 
fertilization  which  is  always  going  on  in  the  realm 
of  ideas.     And  ideas  have  no  country. 

National  personality  is,  of  course,  a  different 
matter.  It  has  been  often  explained,  but  in  few 
places,  recently,  so  well  as  in  Senor  Madariaga's 
book  of  essays,  Shelley  ajid  Calderdu.  "It  is,  indeed, 
in  relation  to  national  character  that  the  study  of 
foreign  literature  is  most  illuminating,  and,  if  there 
are  such  things  as  foreign  literatures,  it  is  less  to  the 
multiplicity  of  languages  than  to  the  multiplicity  of 
national  characters  that  we  owe  them — witness  the 
differences  between  American  and  English,  Swiss 
and  German,  Spanish  and  Spanish-American  liter- 
atures. A  national  character  may  be  defined  as  a 
set  of  tendencies  determined  by  the  relative  strength 
of  the  tendencies  which  compose  it.  All  tendencies 
are  in  all  men,  and  that  is  the  basis  of  human  unity 
and  solidarity.  It  cannot  be  said  that  one  people  is 
intelligent  and  another  one  is  not;  that  one  lacks 
imagination  and  another  one  moral  sense.  All 
peoples  possess  all  the  elementary  essences  of  human 
nature;  but  all  peoples  do  not  possess  them  in  equal 


CONTEMPORARY  CRITICISM  49 

proportions.  Hence  national  character.  For  a  dif- 
ference in  quality  is  but  a  synthesis  of  quantitative 
differences."^ 

We  may  sum  up  the  attitude  toward  nationalism 
in  drama  by  saying  that  when  it  appears  as  some- 
thing consciously  imposed  by  the  artist  upon  his 
material,  it  is  extraneous, — an  excrescence,  a  par- 
asite, and  vitiating;  when  it  is  exhaled  from  his 
work  as  one  of  its  integral  characteristics,  it  is  part 
and  parcel  of  the  creative  personality  and,  as  such, 
a  component  of  art. 

Freud  and  the  Contemporary  Drama.  With  the 
psychoanalysts,  the  various  transformations  of  the 
theory  of  sexual  repression  and  their  importance  to 
neuropathy  we  have  here  no  concern.  It  was  cer- 
tain from  the  start,  however,  that  Freud  was  to 
have  an  extensive  influence  upon  the  literature  of 
the  day,  particularly  as  literature  itself,  from  the 
Freudian  standpoint,  is  a  species  of  dreaming,  of 
wish-fulfillment,  amenable  to  the  dream  interpreta- 
tion that  has  brought  fame  to  this  Viennese  Jew. 
Freud  himself  applied  his  methods  to  literary 
products.  In  our  own  country  Jones,  Coriat,  Pres- 
cott,  and  others  have  done  the  same.  The  very 
name  of  the  most  widely  known  "complex"  is  taken 
from  a  Greek  tragedy,  as  is  its  sister  situation.  Mr. 
Albert  Mordell,  in  two  books,^  has  sought  to  apply 
the  Freudian  method  to  criticism  itself.  But  psycho- 
analytic criticism  of  literature,  at  best,  uses  the 
literary  product  as  a  starting-point  for  biological 
analysis;  it  does  not  properly  enter  the  aesthetic  field. 
Its  true  function  is  elucidation,  not  appreciation, — 

'  Shelley  and  Calderon.     By  Salvador  de  Madariaga.     New  York  (n.  d.)- 
'  The  Erotic  Motive  in  Literature.     New  York,  1919.     The  Literature  of  Ecstasy. 
New  York,  1921. 
4 


50         THE  DRAMA  OF  TRANSITION 

understanding  and  not  beauty,  science  and  not  art. 
It  may  explain  the  genesis  of  a  work  of  art,  but  aids 
a^'sthetic  enjoyment  only  through  whatever  light  it 
may  cast  upon  the  foundations  of  personality.  This, 
it  may  be  added,  is  all  that  the  chief  Freudians 
attempt,  and  they  have  without  a  doubt  brought  to 
literary  investigation  some  of  the  most  important 
processes  that  students  have  learned.' 

The  assertion  that  we  all  live  a  common  life 
in  the  unconscious  gave  to  universality  in  art  a 
new  meaning;  we  no  longer  scratch  Russians  to 
find  Tartars,  we  scratch  civilization  and  come  upon 
savagery.  More  important  still,  the  Freudians 
centered  interest  upon  the  necessity  of  the  liberated 
personality;  the  literary  process  thus  becomes  syn- 
onymous with  released  repressions.  Writers,  always 
in  search  of  new  themes,  were  bound  to  seize  upon 
the  unknown  continent  discovered  by  the  new 
Columbus;  they  were  bound,  too,  to  render  them- 
selves and  the  discoverer  ridiculous  by  over-emphasis, 
misapplication,  inartistic  use  of  material,  and  all  the 
other  exaggerations  into  which  novelty  beguiles  the 
unwary.  Sophocles,  writing  as  an  artist  probing 
the  human  soul,  knew  nothing  about  psychoanalysis, 
nor  about  the  (Edipus  situation,  yet  Freud  went  to 
him  for  a  symbol;  the  difference  between  the  an- 
cient Greek  and  Mr,  D.  H.  Lawrence  is  that  the 
one  knew  nothing  about  these  "complexes"  and  the 
other — despite  his  natural  gifts  as  a  novelist  and  a 

'  I  would  refer  the  interested  reader  to  a  recent  volume  issued  at  WashinRton: 
Psychoanalysis  and  the  Drama,  by  Smith  Ely  Jeliffe  and  Louise  Brink.  1922. 
The  plays  considered  as  texts  for  psychoanalytic  doctrine  are  Chesterton's  Magic, 
Gliddens  and  Marcin's  Eyes  of  Youth,  Raphael's  Peter  Ihhetson,  Tolstoi's  iR*- 
dempiion,  Kennedy's  The  Army  With  Banners,  Benrimo-Hazelton's  The  WilUrw 
Tree,  Hazelton-Cochrane-Benrimo's  The  Yellow  Jacket,  Barrie's  Dear  Brutus  and 
Benelli's  The  Jest.  The  danger  of  such  studies  as  these  is  that  value  as  a  text 
may  be  confused  with  sesthetic  value,  and  I  am  not  sure  that  the  authors  have  not 
fallen  more  than  once  into  this  very  error. 


CONTEMPORARY  CRITICISM  51 

dissector  of  souls — seems  to  know  nothing  else. 
Sophocles,  to  continue  the  strange  comparison  for 
the  sake  of  our  point,  anticipated  Freud  by  being 
true  to  human  nature;  Lawrence,  particularly  of 
late,  is  true  rather  to  Freud.  I  do  not  disparage  his 
novels,  of  which  I  admire  the  earliest  most.  I  do, 
however,  believe  that  the  author's  self-conscious 
Freudianism  has  spoiled  page  after  page  of  his  work; 
much  in  this  should  have  been  saved  for  his  little 
treatise,  which,  thank  Heaven,  he  did  not  decide  to 
turn  into  a  novel  as  well,  with  all  its  misty  mysticism 
and  involved  psycho-poetry. 

We  shall  note,  then,  in  one  country  after  the 
other,  how  the  newer  dramatists,  like  their  fellow 
novelists,  were  quick  to  seize  upon  the  psycho- 
analytic suggestions:  Glaspell  and  O'Neill  in  the 
United  States,  not  to  mention  the  lesser  fry,  who 
were  sure  to  misunderstand  and  garble;  Evreinov 
in  Russia,  whose  monodrama,  as  I  try  to  show, 
fairly  follows  the  Freudian  dream-structure  and  at- 
tempts to  apply  the  single-person  point  of  view; 
some  of  the  "grotesque"  school  of  Italy,  who,  not 
content,  like  Wedekind,  to  write  plays  that  sug- 
gest a  nightmare,  actually  direct  that  the  actors 
shall  employ  the  nightmare  technique;  the  German 
Expressionists.  Not  that  the  dream  mechanism  is 
new  upon  the  stage;  but  the  contemporary  dramatist, 
as  often  as  not,  makes  a  conscious  use  of  it  as  the 
result  of  the  Freudianism  in  the  air;  and  by  Freud- 
ianism I  mean  not  merely  the  particular  theory  of 
Freud,  but  the  psychoanalytic  atmosphere  in  gen- 
eral. To  the  critic  the  question  is,  not  how  success- 
fully the  artist  has  proved  Freud,  but  how  success- 
fully he  has  used  this  suggestion,  as  any  other,  to 


52         THE  DRAMA  OF  TRANSITION 

create  a  vital  play.  Sophocles,  Shakespeare,  Goethe, 
all  did  it  before  Freud  himself  was  dreamed  of; 
others  will  do  it  in  spite  of  the  contagion  of  Freud- 
ianism.  Each  generation  mjjst  have  its  intellectual 
slang  of  thought,  if  so  we  may  call  it.  The  day  be- 
fore yesterday  we  spoke  in  terms  of  Spencer  and 
Darwin;  yesterday  it  was  Nietzsche;  this  morning 
it  was  Freud,  this  afternoon  Einstein.  To-morrow 
—  ?  These  are  but  incidentals  to  the  artist,  who 
must  speak  a  language  of  all  time;  if  Freud  can 
provide  the  inner  stimulus,  let  it  be  he;  or  any  other, 
provnded  the  work  of  art  appear. 

Censorship  of  the  Stage.  Mention  of  Freud  and 
censorship  in  the  same  breath  tempts  one  to  amusing 
animadversions  upon  the  psychology  of  the  reformer. 
Somewhere  the  irreverent  Mencken  has  expressed  a 
fear  that  few  of  them  would  be  equal  to  the  most 
ordinary  temptations;  as  Freud  might  put  it,  their 
very  super-activity  as  reformers  is  itself  a  form  ol 
combating  the  impulses  within  them  which  they 
would  throttle  in  others.  But  I  leave  this  to  the 
psychopaths,  who,  I  hope,  will  make  a  good  job  of 
it.  My  own  concern  here  is  with  the  censors  and 
the  stage;  the  stage  daily  seems  to  be  getting  the 
worst  of  it. 

To  state  my  personal  attitude  in  the  shortest  pos- 
sible form:  I  am  unequivocally  opposed  to  any 
form  of  censorship  whatsoever.  Rather  than  yield 
to  the  reformers  on  the  most  minor  point,  as 
a  playwright  I  would  withdraw  from*the  field  and 
write  plays  to  be  printed  for  private  distribution. 
Let  us  distinguish  between  art  and  business,  how- 
ever. There  is  a  fortune  invested  in  the  theatre  as 
a   commercial   institution;   managers   must   live;   so 


CONTEMPORARY  CRTICISIM  53 

must  playwrights;  if  that  hving  collides  with  power- 
ful reformers,  the  managers — none  too  eager  as  a 
body  for  the  interests  of  art — are  as  business  men 
justified  in  seeking  to  placate  the  powers.  But  let 
not  these  powers  deceive  themselves;  they  are  not 
advancing  public  morality  one  step  by  such  a 
"conversion"  of  the  managers,  who,  were  it  possible, 
would  send  them  all  a-packing  at  the  first  oppor- 
tunity. Having  said  which,  let  us  leave  the  man- 
agers to  their  business,  and  may  it  prosper. 

The  censor  has  no  more  right  to  dictate  to  the 
artist  than  has  the  manager  himself.  And  to  dic- 
tate in  matters  of  sex  is  to  choke  the  stream  at  its 
very  source.  Jameson  has  sneered  at  the  importance 
given  to  sex  in  the  contemporary  play,  relegating  it 
as  a  factor  in  life  to  a  position  far  below  that  of  the 
Nietzschean  will  to  power.  No  doubt  the  future 
will  witness  a  diminished  position  occupied  by  sex 
in  daily  thought  and  in  art,  for  with  a  change  in 
attitude  toward  our  moral  problems — and  there  are 
few  things  in  history  that  change  so  often  and  that 
agree  in  different  countries  so  little  during  the  same 
eras — will  come  a  lessening  of  the  morbid  preoccu- 
pation with  a  beautiful  well-spring  that  the  eternal 
censors  have  defiled.  Yet,  Jameson  notwithstand- 
ing, there  will  be  such  a  preoccupation  as  long  as 
men  are  men  and  women,  women;  it  is  an  eternal 
theme;  it  is  at  the  centre  of  life,  and  for  the  censor 
to  govern  its  expression  is  ridiculously  like  letting 
the  prison  be  run  by  the  jail-birds.  If  a  play  is 
frankly  and  commercially  indecent,  that  is  a  prob- 
lem for  the  police;  we  are  not  interested  in  it.  The 
artist,  however,  to  the  censor,  is  as  east  to  west, 
and  never  the  twain  shall  meet.     His  business  is 


54         THK  DRAMA  OF  TRANSITION 

self-expression  and  seU-comnuinication;  just  in  so 
far  as  he  yields  an  inch  of  his  ground  to  the  enemy, 
he  surrenders  so  much  of  his  birthright.  Rather  sex 
rampant  than  any  form  of  censorship,  for  at  least 
we  should  be  sincere  savages.  There  is  no  compro- 
mise here;  even  thought  of  compromise  is,  on  the 
artist's  part,  surrender.  Kor  an  author's  society, 
then,  to  treat  with  the  reformers,  may  be  good  busi- 
ness; it  is  high  treason  to  art.  To  agree  upon  the 
selection  of  a  catholic  body  of  censors  may  placate 
the  multitude  and  may  educate  the  censorious;  but 
in  principle  it  is  just  such  high  treason.  For,  at 
bottom,  the  censorship  represents  the  intnision  of 
theology.  It  is  founded  up>on  the  very  uncertain 
proposition  that  the  flesh  is  evil, — a  transvaluation 
of  all  art  values.  It  knows  nothing  of  the  spirit, 
much  as  it  may  prate  about  it.  It  is  the  negation 
o\  art. 

It  presents,  moreover,  another  danger, — that  of 
the  censorship  of  ideas.  Indeed,  the  censorship  we 
have  just  been  discussing  is  nothing  but  control  of  a 
central  idea.  From  the  attempt  to  control  the  ex- 
pression of  sex  to  that  of  controlling  expression  of 
unpopular  ideas  upon  economics,  politics,  and  other 
matters  that  involve  the  stability  of  institutions 
favoring  the  dominance  of  class  or  caste,  is  but  a 
short  step.  Religious  repression  and  politico- 
economic  oppression  are  ugly  twin  sisters. 

"You're  not  a  respectable  man,"  says  the  cajol- 
ing Mrs.  Muskat,  trying  to  flatter  Liliom  into  re- 
turning to  his  position  at  the  merry-go-round. 
"You're  an  artist."  Well,  let  no  such  distinction 
frighten  us.  Nor  the  curse  of  conformity  that  hangs 
like  a  pall  over  the   entire  country,  until  a  thinker 


CONTEMPORARY  CRITICISM  55 

like  Santayana  may  write:  "Though  it  calls  itself 
the  land  of  freedom,  it  is  really  the  land  of  compul- 
sions, and  one  of  the  greatest  compulsions  is  that  we 
must  think  and  feel  alike.  .  .  ."  Censorship  tends 
to  just  such  conformity;  it  is  the  denial  of  artistic 
personality;  as  a  member  of  the  body  politic,  the 
writer,  if  he  be  worthy  of  his  salt,  must  fight  it  as 
best  he  can;  as  an  artist,  he  will  ignore  it. 

And  so  we  return  to  poor  Liliom:  "Nobody's 
right — but  they  all  think  they  are  right.  ...  A 
lot  they  know."  One  thing,  however,  we  may 
know:  that  amid  the  eternal  uncertainty,  we  have 
the  right  to  select,  for  ourselves,  our  particular 
views,  amenable  to  such  change  as  experience  and 
a  deeper  life  may  bring;  that  choosing  is  either  our 
own  work  or  we  are  slaves. 

"Every  dramatist,"  Mr.  Lewisohn  has  written, 
"accepts  or  rejects  the  ideas  upon  which  characters 
act.  He  shapes  the  consequences  of  their  actions 
according  to  his  sense  of  the  quality  of  the  ideas 
that  urge  them  on.  Upon  his  view  of  the  world, 
upon  his  reaction  to  moral  ideas,  will  depend  his 
choice  and  conduct  of  his  fable  and  the  end  to  which 
he  brings  the  lives  of  which  he  treats.  It  is  a  better 
preparation  for  the  career  of  a  dramatist  to  have 
watched  the  actions  of  a  few  villagers  and  to  have 
brooded  over  those  actions  at  that  spiritual  core 
where  criticism  and  creation  are  one  than  to  have 
read  all  the  manuals  of  play-writing  and  stagecraft 
in  the  world  and  be  an  expert  on  lighting  and  dec- 
oration. Shun  the  theatre.  It  is  a  place  of  confu- 
sion for  the  dramatist.  Beethoven  wrote  his  sym- 
phonies in  a  little  room.     They  can  be  played  by 


56         THE  DRAMA  OF  TRANSITION 

twenty  men  or  by  a  hundred,  in  a  barn  or  a  temple. 
The  mechanism  of  production  is  not  your  business; 
it  is  your  servant.  Your  business  is  with  man  and 
his  world  and  the  ideas  that  reconcile  him  to  it  or 
drive  him  to  despair. 

"It  is,  then,  his  vision  of  the  world  and  of  the  will 
that  dictates  the  dramatist's  choice  and  treatment 
of  a   fable.     Accident   has   nothing   to  do  with   it; 
ingenuity    has   nothing    to   do   with    it.      You    hear 
stories  of  plays  'tinkered  with  on  the  road.'     Mr. 
Belasco    takes    a   manuscript    and    rewrites    it.      A 
dramatist  whose  play  can  be  'tinkered  with'  or  re- 
written or  revised  by  an  alien  hand  has  not  begun 
to   comprehend   the  elementary   conditions  of  any 
art.     His  play  may  not  be  inevitable  under  the  as- 
pect of  eternity.    He  is  but  a  man.    He  is,  perhaps, 
but  a  manikin.    But  it  must  seem  inevitable  to  him. 
It  must  be  so  interwoven  with  his  profoundest  per- 
ceptions, instincts,  convictions,  that  he  is  willing  to 
labor  for  it,  starve  for  it,  die  for  it.     Unless  it  is  an 
inseparable  part  of  his  own  soul's  integrity — it  is 
nothing.      Why   have    the    managers    the    habit   of 
demanding  changes,  revisions,  adaptations   for  the 
needs  of  this  season,  that  theatre,  a  certain  star? 
Because    they    are  not  dealing  with    dramatists  at 
all,  but  with  mechanics,  journeymen,  hacks.    There 
can  be  no  compromise  on  this  question.    This  is  the 
final   test.      Do   you    think   that   your  play  can    be 
changed  by  another  or  for  another's  convenience  or 
use?     Destroy  it  and  work  with  your  hands.     This 
does  not  mean  that  your  play  is  perfect.     Having 
destroyed  it,  you  yourself  may  relive  its  sources  in 
experience,    dig    deeper    into    your    own    soul,    and 
create  it  afresh.     But  if  Mr.  Belasco  thinks  he  can 


CONTEMPORARY  CRITICISM  57 

use  it  after  laying  upon  it  a  judicious  hand,  be  sure 
that  only  the  fire  will  cleanse  it  and  your  shame."^ 

An  age  of  transition  is  not  one  in  which  the  highest 
attainments  of  the  drama  may  be  studied.  Yet  it 
may  exhibit  the  sincere  strivings  of  the  artist  and 
reveal  the  lowly  origins  of  future  greatness.  In  any 
case,  as  a  human  spectacle,  it  is  absorbing.  We  turn 
to  it  now,  to  view  it  in  the  light  of  such  liberal 
principles  as  may  have  been  gathered  from  the 
preceding  pages.  We  demand  intellectual  freedom 
of  the  playwrights;  we  must  begin  by  ourselves 
possessing  it. 

'  World,  Will,  and  Word,  in  The  Literary  Review,  January  21,  1922. 


SPAIN 


SPAIN 

JOSE  ECHEGARAY 

To  all  but  his  countrymen,  Jose  Echegaray  was 
the  author  of  The  Great  Galeoto  and  little  else;  to 
the  history  of  his  nation's  drama  he  will  perhaps 
remain  little  more.  Yet,  when  he  passed  away  upon 
September  15,  191 6,  Spain  lost  one  of  the  most 
remarkable  figures  that  it  has  reared  in  recent  years. 
For  fatal  fertility,  for  sheer  versatility  of  talents, 
he  was  notable  even  in  a  land  that  had  produced  a 
Lope  de  Vega  with  his  fifteen  hundred  dramas. 
For  four  decades  he  fairly  dominated  the  Spanish 
stage,  at  the  same  time  making  for  himself  a  repu-  \  < 
tation  as  scientist,  mathematician,  publicist,  orator, 
educator,  moralist,  and,  I  believe,  authority  upon 
bridge  construction.  Perhaps  it  was  this  dazzling 
career,  rather  than  his  few  worthy  plays,  that  in- 
fluenced the  Nobel  commission,  in  1904,  to  award 
the  prize  for  literature  to  him,  in  company  of 
the  Provencal  poet.  Mistral.  Surely  the  dramatic 
output  of  the  protean  publicist  had  earned  the  dis- 
tinction more  through  quantity  than  quality.  Long 
before  1904  his  most  significant  work  for  the  stage 
had  been  completed.  In  English  he  had  been  known 
through  The  Great  Galeoto^  which  has  been  trans- 
lated a  number  of  times  and  given  upon  the  stage 
in  at  least  two  acting  versions:  that  by  Maude 
Banks  and  a  freer  (and  not  altogether  adequate) 
version  by  Charles  Nirdligner,  known  as  The  World 

61 


62         THE  DRAMA  OF  TRANSITION 

and  His  It'ife,  and  acted  by  Favcrsham.  One  other 
of  his  plays,  Mariana^  was  also  once  familiar  to 
English  audiences  in  occasional  performances  by 
Mrs.  Patrick  Campbell. 

It  is  now  more  than  forty-five  years  since  Eche- 
garay  made  his  unpretentious  and  somewhat  ma- 
ture debut  upon  the  Spanish  stage,  with  a  clever 
one-act  play  entitletl  El  Libro  Talonario  {The  Check 
Book).  Before  that  date  he  had  been  known  to  the 
intellectual  public  in  some  of  the  numerous  ca- 
pacities I  have  just  mentioned.  His  speeches  in 
favor  of  free  trade,  especially,  had  won  the  approba- 
tion of  the  nation's  leading  minds.  Hut  upon  the 
event  of  The  Check  Book  the  public  was  asked  to 
accept  the  versatile  figure  in  a  new  role,  and  it 
was  not  long  before  the  resourceful  Spaniard  had 
added  another  province  to  his  conquests. 

His  attraction  to  the  stage  was  largely  the  result 
of  the  success  there  won  by  his  younger  brother 
Miguel,  whose  comedies  are  still  popular  in  Spain. 
Echegaray,  the  older,  produced  his  first  play  at  the 
age  of  forty-two — a  fact  which  explains  much  in 
the  subsequent  career  of  the  dramatist.  He  brought 
to  the  stage  a  vast  political  acumen,  a  mature  life 
of  constant  study  and  activity,  a  mind  naturally 
given  over  to  moral,  mathematical,  and  social  con- 
siderations. His  was  not  the  steady  growth  of  the 
artist  groping  in  the  recesses  of  creative  fancy;  he 
came  to  the  theatre  with  a  view  of  life  that  was  well 
defined.  In  the  drama  he  saw,  not  so  much  a  vehicle 
for  art,  not  a  form  in  which  to  encase  beauty,  but 
rather  a  means  for  exploiting  his  own  particular 
moral  principles.  He  is  thus  frankly  a  writer  of 
problem  plays,  and  it  must  be  confessed  at  the  out- 


SPAIN  63 

set  that  for  the  most  part  he  has  allowed  his  thesis 
to  predominate,  much  to  the  cost  of  any  higher 
dramatic  art. 

Echegaray,  moreover,  is  in  many  respects  quite 
as  significant  to  the  history  of  the  Spanish  stage  as 
he  is  to  the  stage  itself.  Not  since  the  days  of  the 
classical  epoch  has  a  dramatic  author  been  received-^ 
so  widely  in  his  own  land;  he  is  the  first  of  the 
modern  Spanish  playwrights  to  have  procured  ample 
recognition  outside  the  limits  of  his  nation's  borders. 
To  him  came  the  vogue  that  was  denied  Tamayo  y 
Baus  (author  of  A  New  Drama),  who  was  an  in- 
finitely more  artistic  spirit;  to  him  came  the  pop- 
ularity that  Lopez  de  Ayala  could  not  attain,  de- 
spite his  superior  poetic  gifts.  While  much  of  this 
popularity  may  be  ascribed  to  reasons  none  too 
flattering  to  the  methods  of  The  Great  Galeoto  s 
creator,  some  of  it  was  due,  no  doubt,  to  the  more  \ 
cosmopolitan  outlook  of  this  thinker — to  his  tend- 
ency to  break  the  bonds  of  a  narrowing  nationalism. 
Where  so  many  of  the  Spanish  dramatists  were 
content  to  be  Spanish,  Echegaray,  in  his  best  plays, 
becomes  European. 

It  is  important  to  notice  in  connection  with  his 
dramas  that  Echegaray  has  helped  to  alter  the  very 
pivot  upon  which  the  Spanish  stage  revolves — the 
so-called  punto  de  honor,  the  point  of  honor.^  This 
peculiar  moral  code  has  for  its  central  idea  the 
absolute  chastity  of  the  female.  Woman  becomes  a 
sublimated  concept  that  is  not  even  to  be  gazed 
upon    covetously    with    impunity.      The    insistence 

'  The  point  of  honor  has  been  referred  to  Moorish  influence  (Cf.  Viel  Castel, 
Revue  des  Deux  Monies,  pages  397,  442,  1841),  and  to  the  Italians  (Donald  Clive 
Stuart,  Romanic  Review,  Vol.  I,  Nos.  3,  4).  It  is,  in  essence,  as  drama,  a  special- 
ized form  of  the  "eternal  triangle." 


64         THE  DRAMA  OF  TRANSITION 

upon  her  lily-white  purity  becomes  a  fierce,  almost 
voluptuously  virtuous  passion  on  the  part  of  her 
natural  protector,  man.  For  more  than  two  cen- 
turies the  stage  in  Spain  had  been  trammeled  by 
the  point  of  honor,  which  is  less  intelligible  to  the 
Anglo-Saxon  than  to  a  Latin  audience.  Not  even 
the  great  Lope  de  Vega  had  entirely  overcome  the 
narrowing  influence  of  such  an  ethical  punctilio 
which,  in  one  of  the  greatest  of  the  classical  dramas, 
Del  Key  Abajo  Ningiitio  {Xone  Beneath  the  King), 
by  Rojas  y  Zorrilla,  reaches  a  clmiax  of  artistic 
beauty  and  irrational  injustice  to  blameless  woman- 
hood. From  the  standpoint  of  the  ptDito  de  honor 
Echegaray's  plays  may  be  said  to  mark  a  transi- 
tional stage.  The  frankly  masculine  view  inherent 
in  the  point  of  honor  gives  way  in  his  best  work  to 
an  attitude  more  just  to  woman.  In  none  of  his 
pieces,  however,  does  he  reach  the  independence  of 
that  more  radical  spirit,  Perez  Galdos,  as  exhibited 
in  the  justly  noted  Electra. 

Echegaray's  general  conception  of  the  dramatist's 
sphere  may  be  best  studied  in  the  preface  to  his  first 
social  drama,  Como  Empieza  Y  Como  Acaba  {The 
-Beginning  and  the  End),  produced  on  November  9, 
1876.  This  is  also  the  first  of  a  triolgy  which  pos- 
sesses as  its  motif  the  persistence  of  an  evil  deed 
through  several  generations.  The  author's  dramatic 
mainspring  is  here  presented  as  "the  logic  of  fatalitv," 
which,  he  says,  "dominates  when  moral  liberty 
cedes  to  passion  its  place  in  the  human  soul."  The 
dramatist,  then,  would  have  us  consider  him  a 
fatalist,  and  he  has  elsewhere  said  that  "Fate  writes 
greater  tragedies  than  playwrights,"  but  a  close 
study  of  his  several   score  of  plays  shows  clearly 


SPAIN  65 

that  his  Fate  is  purely  a  social  phenomenon — the 
familiar  and  inevitable  opposition  of  society  as   a     - 
whole  to  the  desires  of  the  individual. 

Of  Greek  fate  there  is  little  or  nothing  in  the  ^ 
Spanish  playwright,  although  he  has  succeeded  as 
no  other  in  his  own  land  in  giving  to  the  world 
about  us  all  the  characteristics  of  a  cold,  imper- 
sonal, implacable  fate.  In  his  better  plays  he  has 
risen  above  his  theories.  We  cannot  take  seriously 
to-day  a  dramatist  who  justifies  the  incongruities  of 
his  work  by  referring  back  to  newspaper  originals, 
or  to  such  a  metaphysical  formula  as  the  "logic  of 
fatality."  Logic  and  fate  are  really  two  antithetical 
concepts,  and  to  link  them  creates  a  paradox  whose 
ill  effect  is  easily  discernible  in  the  many  melodramas 
of  Echegaray,  where  improbability  clashes  against 
absurdity  and  the  curtain  descends  on  a  crescendo 
of  empty  effect. 

The  motif  par  excellence  of  Echegaray 's  dramas  j 
is  the  conflict  between  two  inherently  opposing  duties  ', 
or  forces.  Now  it  is  a  daughter  who  sacrifices  her  '' 
own  happiness  in  order  to  shield  her  father  from  the 
consequences  of  an  indiscretion;  now  it  is  a  son  who, 
in  order  to  save  his  father  from  disgrace,  gives  up  a 
happy  marriage.  Again,  we  find  a  scientist  pitted 
against  the  cohorts  of  superstition,  or  a  father  who 
assumes  responsibiHty  for  the  crime  of  his  illegiti- 
mate son,  thus  expiating  his  own  crime  against 
society.  The  characters  of  these  plays  all  seem  to 
exist  for  the  satisfaction  of  their  morbid  desires  for 
self-sacrifice  and  expiation.  From  this  standpoint 
the  theatre  of  Echegaray  presents  a  long  procession 
of  illegitimate  children,  of  heroines  in  ill-merited 
dishonor,  heroes  of  the  exaggerated  Hugoesque  type, 


66         THE  DRAMA  OF  TRANSITION 

villains   too  often   reminiscent  of  the   nickel   novel 
"hair-raiser."     So  that  he  has  created  many  situa- 
jtions,  innumerable  problems,  but  little  character. 

Of  humor  there  is  little  enough  in  this  serious 
Spaniard.  His  moral  aim  accords  ill  with  undue 
levity.  The  most  irreconcilable  opponent  of  the 
playwright  must  admit,  however,  that  he  excels 
in  harrowing  efforts,  in  a  certain  gloomy  power,  in 
a  sheer  vehemence  and  momentum  of  language  that 
carry  along  the  worst  of  his  plays.  Ouite  negligible 
on  the  whole  as  a  poet,  he  is  scarcely  more  eminent 
as  a  writer  of  dramatic  prose,  yet  there  is  a  power  in 
his  phraseology,  an  attraction  in  his  figurative 
speech,  in  the  C)ricntal  }>rofusion  of  his  bizarre  con- 
ceptions, that  does  much  to  redeem  his  other  defi- 
ciencies. There  is  little  continental  artistry  in  the 
average  Echcgaray  production.  He  lacked  the 
power  of  self-criticism,  of  technical  finesse;  he  was 
a  moral  force  rather  than  an  artistic  spirit.  His 
fancy  would  penetrate  a  situation,  his  mind  would 
supply  a  contention,  his  powerful  language  could 
easily  fuse  the  whole,  and  his  electric  energy  thus 
galvanized  a  play  into  existence. 

It  may  be  questioned  whether  the  Spaniard  wrote 
anv  really  notable  work  after  the  memorable  date 
oi  El  Gran  Galeoto^  1881.  Since  then  he  added  much 
to  the  bulk  of  his  labors,  but  not  usually  of  a  quality 
to  enhance  his  reputation.  Beginning  in  1874,  and 
writing  incessantly,  he  registered  a  surprisingly 
small  number  of  failures  for  a  dramatist  of  such. 
prolific  talent.  In  such  plays  as  La  Esposa  del  | 
Veyigador  {The  Avenger's  Bride)  and  En  el  Puno  de 
la  Espada  {On  the  Sword^s  Point) ^  he  actually  re 
v^ived  the  waning  melodrama  in  Spain  and  lent  it 


SPAIN  67 

new  life,  infusing  a  vigor  and  a  cult  of  the  grandiose 
that  he  had  imbibed  from  Victor  Hugo  and  the  elder 
Dumas.  It  was  through  the  younger  Dumas  and 
through  Henrik  Ibsen,  together  with  a  host  of  minor 
influences,  that  he  was  soon  led  to  the  social  drama, 
a  form  to  which  his  very  temperament,  as  well  as 
the  traditions  of  his  national  stage,  was  bound 
sooner  or  later  to  carry  him.  This,  nevertheless, 
did  not  prevent  Blanco  Garcia  from  writing  that  the 
social  drama  was  "more  averse  than  favorable"  to 
his  spirit — a  criticism,  perhaps,  that  shows  a  per- 
sonal aversion  to  the  type  of  drama  rather  than  a 
critical  distinction.  Echegaray  was  eclectic  by 
nature  and  environment,  and  his  work  reflects  the 
dominant  tendencies  of  his  time,  yet  there  is  also 
the  imprint  of  his  own  rigid  personality. 

Three  years  after  his  debut  he  startled  his  audi- 
ences with  0  Locura  0  Sa?Jtidad?  {Madman  or  Saint?) 
in  which  the  influence  of  Ibsen  first  appears  to  any 
appreciable  extent.  The  play,  one  of  the  three  or 
four  worthy  companions  to  The  Great  Galeoto^  pre- 
sents many  analogies  to  Brand,  which  may  have 
inspired  the  Spaniard  in  his  first  signal  effort.  Just 
as  the  Norwegian  priest  sacrifices  the  spirit  to  the 
letter,  creating  a  hell  of  ruin  in  his  search  for  heaven, 
so,  too,  Lorenzo,  discovering  that  his  name  and  his 
fortune  are  in  reality  not  his  own,  is  brought  to  the 
verge  of  insanity  by  the  clash  of  the  two  opposing 
forces — his  daughter's  happiness  in  marriage  to  a 
noble,  which  cannot  take  place  under  the  true  state 
of  circumstances  (at  least  Lorenzo's  honesty  pro- 
tests against  it,  despite  the  plebeian  willingness  of 
the  parties  concerned),  and  Lorenzo's  "duty"  to  re- 
linquish his  name  ajid  fortune.    This  would  destroy, 


68         THE  DRAMA  OF  TRANSITION 

too,  the  happiness  ot  his  mother  (through  whose 
ruse  his  plans  of  sacrifice  are  frustratcil)  and  of  his 
wife. 

The  strujTgle  leads  Lorenzo  to  the  asylum,  while 
we  are  left  to  hope  that  all  will  right  itself  in  time. 
Was  Lorenzo  a  madjTian  or  a  saint,  so  to  insist 
upon  his  duty? 

Between  this  play  and  El  Gran  Galeoto  intervened 
eleven  dramas  of  varying  merit,  among  these  the 
play  which,  I  believe,  can  well  claim  the  odious 
distinction  of  being  the  worst  ever  penned  by  its 
author — Mar  Sin  Orillas  {The  Shoreless  Sea).  It  is 
one  of  the  puzzles  of  the  human  intellect  that  the 
mind  capable  of  The  Great  Galeoto  should  be  able  to 
descend  to  the  puerile  ineptitude  and  absurdity  of 
The  Shoreless  Sea.  The  point  of  honor  is  here  urged 
to  farcical  extremes — piracy,  raj>c,  intrigue,  all 
crowd  the  stage  amidst  a  veritable  tissue  of  con- 
fusions. When  a  single  word  might  save  the  insipid 
heroine,  she  prefers  to  maintain  an  ambiguous 
silence  before  her  equally  silly  husband.  Repudiated 
by  him,  she  plunges  into  the  sea.  Presently  a  mes- 
sage arrives,  proving  the  wife  innocent  of  the  charge 
which  her  husband  has  preferred  against  her.  Seized 
with  grief  at  his  harshness,  the  husband  follows  his 
wife  into  the  ocean.  All  of  which  was  so  destined 
by  the  author  from  the  very  start. 

Most  of  the  plays  that  followed  The  Great  Galeoto 
tend  but  to  repeat  the  ever-recurrent  motifs  of  the 
playwright — illegitimate  offspring,  outraged  honor, 
malicious  slander,  social  error,  fanaticism,  materi- 
alism, snobbery,  and  so  on,  tlirough  the  gamut  of 
all  possible  social  complications.  Nor  is  Echegaray 
free  from  such  trite  devices  as  "the  papers,"  and  those 


SPAIN  69 

recitations  of  antecedent  events  that  usually,  on  our 
own  stage,  take  the  form  of  "twenty  years  ago," 
etc.,  to  the  accompaniment  of  tremolo  music.  "The 
papers,"  indeed,  come  near  to  spoiling  such  a  play 
as  Madman  or  Saint? 

In  The  Great  Galeoto  we  find  Echegaray  at  his 
best.  It  is  with  justice  recognized  not  only  as  the 
Spaniard's  masterpiece,  but  as  an  addition  to  world- 
literature.  For  once  in  his  career  the  author  almost 
frees  himself  from  the  devices  of  cheap  melodrama. 
Here  is  no  villain  of  the  regular  type,  no  hero,  no 
heroine — all  are  victims  of  a  society  which  in  itself 
means  no  harm.  Therein  lies  the  essence  of  the 
tragedy.  The  casual  remark,  the  fitting  smile,  these 
are  the  elements  that  start  Madrid  talking  of  Julian 
and  his  wife,  Theodora,  and  of  Ernesto,  their  ward, 
whom  the  world  says  is  usurping  the  position  of 
Julian.  With  unswerving  impetus,  with  the  very 
impersonality  of  fate,  the  play  develops  to  its  con- 
clusion. At  the  end  Julian  is  killed  by  the  apparent 
revelation  of  his  wife's  love  for  Ernesto,  yet  neither 
the  wife  nor  the  ward  has  been  really  guilty.  Mad- 
rid's tongues  have  forced  them  together — slander 
has  forged  its  unthinking  lies  to  the  heat  of  apparent 
truth.i 

Few  plays  present  such  a  powerful,  logical, 
convincing  study  of  gossip  and  its  evil  conse- 
quences.   The  art  of  the  play  is  in  its  simple  power. 

>  The  name  of  "The  Great  Galeoto"  is  derived  from  the  story  of  Paolo  and  Fran- 
cesca  in  Dante's  Divine  Comedy.  "Galeotto  fu  il  libro  e  chi  lo  scrisse"  says  Fran- 
cesca  as  she  tells  the  story  of  the  memorable  day  when  she  and  Paul  forgot  them- 
selves. Galeotto  (Galehault)  was  the  intermediary  between  Lancelot  and  Guine- 
vere, and  thus  did  the  book  they  were  reading  serve  as  intermediary  between  Paul 
and  Francesca.  Even  so  does  the  gossip  of  the  world  serve  as  the  intermediary 
that  forces  Ernesto  and  Theodora  together.  It  is  interesting  to  note,  in  this  regard, 
that  the  germ  of  The  Great  Galecto  already  appeared  in  Conio  Empieza  Y  Como 
Acaba.  In  the  latter  play  the  heroine,  Magdalena,  in  reading  Dante  (together  with 
Shakespeare,  a  great  favorite  of  the  author),  comes  across  the  identical  passage 
which  suggested  the  dramatist's  greatest  work. 


70         THE  DRAMA  OF  TRANSITION 

But  four  personages  occupy  the  central  position, 
yet  in  them  we  feel  palpitate  the  heart  of  the  town — 
they  present,  indeed,  the  world  in  miniature,  so 
keenly  do  we  feel  their  presence,  the  effect  of  each 
word  and  of  each  action. 

This  salient  drama  has  been  compared  to  various 
plays.  Sheridan's  School  for  Scandal  has  been  men- 
tioned as  a  frivolous  antecedent.  Othello^  too,  has 
been  adduced  as  an  example  of  the  malignant 
effect  of  gossip.  But  in  Othello  it  is  the  personal 
villany  of  an  lago,  not  the  impersonal,  uninten- 
tional force  of  society,  that  leads  to  the  tragedy. 
For  El  Grau  Galeoto  is  the  drama  of  "They  say." 
To  my  mind,  a  better  comparison  than  either  is 
none  other  than  Much  Ado  About  Nothing.  For 
here  we  have  the  comedy  of  "They  say."  The  plav 
is  all  the  more  comic  in  that  it  represents  a  knowing 
piece  of  amiable  malice;  the  Spanish  drama  is  all 

1  the   more  dramatic   in    that   it   is   the  story   of   an 

'unintentional,  impersonal  infamy. 

llie  Great  Galeoto  reveals  the  influence  of  Ibsen 
in  a  marked  degree.  Even  more  so,  speaking  di- 
rectly, does  El  Hi  jo  de  Don  Juan  {The  Son  of  Don 
yua)i)y  which  has  erroneously  been  termed  the 
Spanish  Ghosts.  Frankly  deriving  its  inspiration 
from  the  Norwegian  tragedy,  Echegaray's  play 
shows  a  difference  in  treatment  and  in  point  of  view 
which  really  entitle  the  play  to  be  called  original. 
Whereas  Ibsen's  Ghosts  shifts  the  blame  of  Oswald's 
plight  back  to  the  society  which  forced  Mrs.  Alving 
to  dwell  with  her  debauched  husband,  Echcgaray 
would  seem  to  indicate  that  the  fault  of  Lazaro's 
insanity  lay  only  in  his  father's  failure  to  live  a 
moral  life. 


SPAIN  71 

Although  the  Spaniard  goes  into  such  horrible 
details  as  would  have  quite  unnerved  Ibsen  him- 
self, he  yet  fails  to  penetrate  into  the  social  basis  of 
his  protagonist's  insanity.  Or,  if  he  does  penetrate, 
he  rests  his  hope  for  betterment  upon  the  individual. 

Echegaray's  play  is  further  complicated  by  the 
fact  that  his  doomed  hero  is  engaged  to  be  married, 
thereby  providing  a  typical  Echegarayan  struggle — 
shall  he  marry,  knowing  his  moral  duty  not  to? 
Must  he  then  give  up  his  only  hope  for  happiness? 
Truly  terrible  in  conception  and  in  treatment  is  the 
scene  where  Lazaro's  father  detects  his  son,  wild  in 
debauch,  tippling  with  the  very  mistress  he  himself 
has  known  too  well.  When  at  last  the  curtain  de- 
scends on  the  cry  of  Lazaro  for  the  sun  (borrowed 
from  Ibsen  because  of  its  beauty,  says  Echegaray), 
the  father,  in  anguish,  cries  out,  "I,  too,  have  asked 
for  it!" 

The  coupHng  of  the  names  of  Echegaray  and  Ibsen, 
largely  due  to  this  play,  has  been  much  overdone  by 
critics  who  have  not  taken  the  trouble  to  examine 
the  works  of  Echegaray  extensively.  There  are 
really  more  differences  between  the  two  than  sim- 
ilarities. In  the  first  place,  Ibsen  is  by  far  the 
greater  artist.  He  chooses  between  prose  and  verse 
with  discrimination,  while  the  Spaniard  seems  to 
waver  between  the  two  with  uncertainty.  Ibsen  is 
the  master  dramaturge,  where  Echegaray  is  too  often 
a  bungler  with  peculiar  talents  that  save  his  work 
from  failure.  Ibsen  is  an  artist  in  search  of  ideas; 
he  grows  from  play  to  play  in  both  art  and 
thought.  Echegaray's  art  is,  excepting  three  or 
four  plays,  a  negligible  quantity;  his  ideas  are  cer- 
tain  from   the  start — he  came  with   them   to  the 


72         THE  DRAMA  CJF    IKANSI  llUN 

stage;  it  is  his  art  that  he  gropes  about  for,  never 
to  discover  it  for  good,  heedless  of  the  critics,  intent 
on  moral  purpose  alone.  Mariana  and  El  Loco 
Dios  {The  Divine  Madman)^  1900,  Jilso  reveal  the 
influence  of  Ibsen.  The  second  of  these  plays  has 
been  termed  by  Fitzmaurice-Kelly,  1  believe,  an  un- 
intentional parody  of  the  Norwegian's  symbolism. 

Although  both  Ibsen  and  Kchcgaray  recognize  the 
role  of  society  in  life,  yet  the  Spaniard  would  seek 
self-realization  in  self-repression,  while  the  Norwe- 
gian hopes  for  the  realization  oi  self  through  the  ex- 
pansion of  self.  Ibsen  is  an  out-and-out  radical; 
Echegaray  is  that  peculiar,  but  familiar,  type  who 
to  the  radical  seems  conservative  and  to  the  con- 
servative seems  radical. 

Gloomy  as  Ibsen  himself  is  Echegaray  in  his  more 
powerful  moi7ients;  as  insistent  as,  and  less  swerv- 
ing than,  Tolstoi  in  his  moral  purpose.  Unsus- 
ceptible to  the  attacks  of  critics,  he  has  rarely 
ventured  to  defend  his  works  except  upon  the  basis 
of  morals.  His  ideal  is  at  once  of  the  past  and  of 
the  future.  With  a  vigor  that  takes  him  back,  on 
the  one  hand,  to  Calderon  he  unites  a  modernity 
that  brings  him  forward,  on  the  other,  to  Ibsen  and 
the  social  philosophers.  His  work,  I  believe,  rep- 
resents a  transitional  period  in  the  history  of  the 
Spanish  stage.  .As  early  as  1903  Bernard  Shaw  had 
said  of  him  that  he  was  made  of  the  stuff  that 
crosses  borders — a  prophecy  which  bore  fulfillment 
on  the  English  stage  some  three  years  later.^ 

>  The  Sha\nan  endorsement  of  such  playwrJRhts  as  Exhcgaray  and  Brieuz  \» 
one  of  the  (>aradoxes  of  the  Irishman's  career.  In  both,  Shaw  saw  more  than  was 
there. 

Most  of  the  preceding  section  on  Echegaray  consists  of  a  ruthless  condensa- 
tion of  a  book  I  wTote  upon  him  as  part  of  the  requirements  for  the  Ph.D.  degree 
in  Romance  Languages  (Harvard,  1912).  I  thought  little  of  Exhegaray  then; 
I  think  less  now — as  of  so  many  other  things.  The  doctorial  thesis  reposes  in  the 
university  archives.    There  let  it  rest  in  pace. 


SPAIN  73 

To  say  that  Echegaray,  on  the  whole,  is  a  bad 
playwright  because  he  is  a  belated  romantic  is  as 
futile  a  toying  with  terms  as  to  pronounce  any 
other  writer  great  because  he  happens  to  be  an 
opportune  realist.  Echegaray,  in  general,  is  an  in- 
ferior dramatist  because  the  plays  themselves  are 
vitiated  at  their  source.  They  do  not  develop  from 
a  core  of  passion,  produced  inevitably  by  the  clash 
of  character  and  circumstance.  They  are  the  arti- 
ficial result  of  a  passion  that  they  do  not  contain. 

"Spanish  dramatists,"  writes  Storm  Jameson, 
"are  making  their  way  towards  a  national  drama 
almost  untouched  by  the  restless  spirit  that  stirred  | 
Italy.  Their  conception  of  life  is  singularly  simple.  ■ 
In  Italy  a  revolt  against  the  forms  of  modern  life; 
in  France,  with  the  exception  of  Brieux,  cynical  and 
witty  ridicule  of  folly;  in  England,  save  from  the 
Celtic  Shaw,  no  very  savage  indignation;  in  the 
north,  generally,  a  dramatic  view  of  life  limited  to 
social  institutions  and  conditions.  But  Spanish 
dramatists,  with  the  rare  exception  of  Dicenta,  are 
not  in  revolt  against  anything,  least  of  all  against 
life."^  With  the  rare  exception  of  Dicenta  ?2  Then 
where  was  Benito  Perez  Galdos,  whose  labors 
Jameson  overlooks  in  their  entirety,  what  though, 
as  a  woman  in  revolt,  she  should  have  been  one 
of  the  first  to  proclaim  the  ideological  virtues  of 
Electra?    Galdos  may  not  be  the  dramatist  of  genius 

^Modern  Drama  in  Europe.     Pages  230-231. 

•Joaquin  Dicenta,  1860-1916.  Yet  Juan  Jose,  Dicenta's  central  drama,  is  not 
a  proletarian  play;  primarily  it  turns  upon  a  pivot  of  frustrated  passion.  The 
workingman,  robbed  of  his  mistress-sweetheart  by  his  employer,  who  later  dis- 
charges him  for  venturing  to  assert  his  prior  rights,  finally  slays  both  the  un- 
faithful woman  and  her  tempter.  Of  course  it  is  easy  to  detect  a  symbol  here, 
if  one  is  so  minded,  revealing  the  maddened  proletarian  slaying  both  his  own 
interests  as  well  as  his  employer's  in  anarchic  revolt.  The  play  itself  is  a  strange 
commingling  of  realism  and  romanticism;  its  sweep  is  as  surely  romantic  as  its 
detail  is  true  to  life.     It  stirs  even  the  reader,  despite  its  shortcomings. 


74  THK  DRAMA  UK    rkANSITION 

that  Ramon  lYrez  dc  Ayala'  has  sought  to  make 
him  out,  but  surely  he  should  have  merited  a  few 
words  in  a  resume  of  modern  Spanish  drama  that 
devotes  half  of  its  space  to  Echegaray.  Of  capital 
importance  to  the  course  of  modern  thought  in 
Spain,  eminent  as  a  novelist,  hclovcd  as  a  per- 
sonality, Galdos  bridges  the  gap  between  the  Spain 
of  yesterday  that  was  Echegaray  and  the  Spain  of 
sto-day  that  is,  upon  the  stage,  Benavente. 

BENITO  PEREZ  GALDOS 

The  life  of  the  noted  writer  stretches  across  a 
span  of  seventy-five  years — years  rich  in  history, 
not  only  for  his  beloved  Spain,  but  for  the  entire 
world.  Born  at  Las  Palmas,  in  the  Canary  Islands, 
on  May  lo,  1845,  ^^  ^^'"^^  ^^^^  ^^  Madrid  in  1863  to 
study  law.  An  unwilling  student  he  was,  like  so 
many  others  of  the  literary  tribe,  and,  again  like 
them,  he  drifted  into  journalism  and  thence  to 
literature,  readily  making  a  name  for  himself  among 
the  Liberal  element.  As  early  as  this  he  had  already 
tried  his  hand  at  art,  for  in  1862,  at  the  Exposition 
in  Santa  Cruz  de  Tenerife,  he  was  awarded  hon- 
orable mention  for  sketches  entitled  La  Magdalena 
and  Un  Boceto  His/orico,  as  well  as  for  an  oil-paint- 
ing called  "Una  Alqueria."  Xor  did  his  love  of  the 
pencil  and  brush  abandon  him  entirely,  for  later  he 
illustrated  his  own  books  in  a  manner  that  called 
forth  the  praise  of  professional  artists,  and  designed 
the  last  resting  place  of  his  famous  friend  Pereda. 
That  friendship,  by  the  way,  which  was  begun  early 
in  the  career  of  the  author  who  yesterday  was 
mourned  wherever  the  Spanish  tongue  is  spoken, 

'See  his  Las  M&scaras,  2  vols,  1919,  Madrid. 


SPAIN  75 

was  one  of  the  strangest  as  well  as  one  of  the  most 
beautiful  in  literary  history,  and  deserves  pages  and 
pages  by  itself;  about  it,  a  paragraph  presently. 

The  man  was  strangely  reticent;  it  has  been  sug- 
gested by  a  noted  Spanish  critic  that  perhaps  he 
put  so  much  of  himself  into  his  voluminous  produc- 
tions that  he  really  cared  little  to  discuss  whatever 
he  may  have  omitted;  in  any  case,  when  asked  by 
even  so  great  a  figure  as  Clarin  (Leopoldo  Alas)  for 
details  as  to  his  early  hfe,  Galdos  replied  in  more 
condensed  fashion  than  a  scant  encyclopaedic  ref- 
erence. He  would  offer  little  beyond  the  fact  that 
he  arrived  in  Madrid  in  1863,  and  that  during  the 
three  or  four  years  that  preceded  the  revolution  of 
1868  he  made  several  attempts  at  writing  pieces  for 
the  theatre,  only  one  of  which  he  was  at  all  content 
with,  though  he  was  glad  that  it  had  never  reached 
the  "boards."  The  passage  is  important  because, 
years  later,  when  Galdos  again  approached  the  stage, 
this  time  with  a  great  reputation  as  a  novelist  be- 
hind him,  his  aims  were  obscured  by  critics  who 
were  somewhat  too  ready  to  discover  that  the 
novelist  was  trying  to  corrupt  drama  by  grafting 
upon  it  procedures  that  belonged  only  in  long  nar- 
ratives. Galdos,  it  appears,  was  in  reality  return- 
ing to  an  early  love,  and  not  all  Spanish  theatrical 
critics  are  inclined  to  agree  with  Fitzmaurice- 
Kelly's  recent  judgment  that  "his  diffuse,  exuberant 
genius  was  scarcely  accommodated  to  the  conven- 
tions of  theatrical  form."  (Enc.  Britannica,  nth 
edition.) 

In  1867  the  idea  came  to  him  for  his  first  book. 
La  Fontana  de  Oro^  which  he  himself  describes  as  a 
work  with   a  certain   revolutionary   tendency.     He 


76         THE  DRAMA  OF  TRANSITION 

began  it  in  Madrid,  completed  it  in  Spain,  and  no 
sooner  did  he  return  to  Spain  than  the  revolution 
broke  out.  He  received  the  new  state  of  affairs 
most  enthusiastically.  It  was  at  this  stage  (from 
1868  to  1872)  that  he  made  the  acquaintance  of  the 
famous  regional  novelist,  Pereda.  At  their  first 
meeting  it  seemed  that  each  had  read  everything 
the  other  had  written,  and  the  friendship  was  dis- 
solved only  by  the  death  of  the  older  man.  Here 
was  Gald6s,  the  standard-bearer  of  liberalism,  of 
anti-clericalism,  of  modernism  in  the  broader  sense 
of  the  word,  a  bosom  friend  of  the  man  who  stood 
squarely  against  evervthing  that  fired  him  who  was 
later  to  write  Dofiu  Perjecta  and  Electra.  Intel- 
lectually speaking,  black  could  be  no  greater  con- 
trast to  white  than  were  the  ideas  and  the  ideals  that 
animated  Pereda  and  Galdos;  yet  despite  the  mut- 
terings  of  friends  and  foes,  despite  the  passing  of 
years  that  brought  them  often  into  conflict,  they 
lived  in  growing  intimacy,  traveled  much  together 
over  the  picturesque  provinces  of  Spain,  and  seemed 
to  symbolize,  by  their  unbroken  fellowship,  the  fact 
that,  underlying  all  the  antagonism  which  divides 
men  into  warring  camps,  into  clashing  sects,  is  a 
fundamental  humanity  that  bridges  all  gaps.  Is 
there  not  something  ironical  in  the  picture  of  Gald6s 
and  Pereda  shaking  hands  above  the  battle,  as  it 
were,  while  down  below  their  adherents  fought  out 
the  bitter  conflict  of  orthodoxy  versus  liberalism,  of 
faith  against  science?  Better  still,  is  there  not 
something  that  laughs  gently  at  sects  and  sectarians 
in  the  familiar  story  of  the  determined  battle  of 
books  that  was  waged  between  the  Liberal  and  the 
Tory? — a  battle  in  which  even  opponents  of  Galdos 


SPAIN  77 

are  forced  to  admit  that  Pereda  came  out  second 
best?  The  two  men  met,  above  even  their  own  per- 
sonal battles,  as  man  and  man.  There  is,  to  me  at 
least,  something  in  that  friendship  which  refutes  the 
narrower  applications  of  the  theories  each  held. 

Clarin  has  described  Galdos  as  he  looked  in  his 
prime,  after  he  had  published  several  of  his  Episo- 
dios  Nacionales  (those  National  Episodes  which  con- 
stitute a  veritable  epic  of  Spanish  history,  as  well  as 
one  of  Galdos'  chief  claims  to  enduring  fame) — the 
forehead  that  bespoke  genius  and  passions;  the  pen- 
etrating eyes  that  conveyed  the  impression  of  ten- 
derness not  unmingled  with  guile^a  certain  inno- 
cent, artist's  guile.  The  author  dressed  neither  well 
nor  badly.  He  was  as  little  inclined  to  talk  as  to 
write  of  himself,  but  on  the  other  hand,  made  a 
willing  as  well  as  skillful  listener,  aptly  steering  the 
conversation  by  means  of  well-directed  questions. 
He  had  no  use  for  the  more  rhetorical  aspects  of  the 
writer's  craft;  indeed,  he  has  been  accused  by  gram- 
marians as  sinning  against  the  language's  purity. 
With  all  respect  to  grammar,  it  was  never  meant 
to  worry  great  writers;  if  a  man  has  not  conquered 
the  prudish  chit  in  his  schoolhood  days,  he  must 
do  without  her  later.  For  one  person  who  writes 
well,  how  many  thousands  write  correctly!  Galdos 
was,  moreover,  fond  of  retiring  early;  he  was  not 
what  one  could  call  a  society  man;  even  the 
theatre,  into  which  he  aspired  to  attract  his  own 
audiences,  was  a  wearying  spectacle  to  him  and 
left  him  with  a  headache.  A  man,  then,  who  be- 
lieved in  hard  work  and  the  simple  life;  who 
carried  on  the  great  tradition  of  Spanish  fecundity; 
who  fought  for  advanced  thought,  now  leading  the 


78         THE  DRAMA  OF  TRANSITION 

crowd,  now  led  by  it;  who  virtually  made  his  coun- 
try's history  live  anew  in  a  series  of  romances  that 
have  more  than  once,  and  by  critics  of  accepted 
authority,  been  compared  to  Balzac  for  the  won- 
derful array  of  living  characters  and  to  Dickens  for 
the  humanity  and  the  humor  that  inform  them. 

Mention  of  Dickens  reminds  us,  too,  that  Galdos 
was  much  influenced  by  English  literature,  with 
which  he  was  very  familiar.  His  foreign  excursions 
took  him  most  trequently  to  London  and  Lcopoldo 
Alas  has  said  that,  in  his  opinion,  Galdos  would  go 
to  Great  Britain  "for  customs,  politics,  and  men, 
.  .  .  but  not  for  women."  The  references  to  Bal- 
zac and  Dickens  are  not  new;  years  ago  Rafael 
Altamira  pointed  out  that  the  resemblance  to 
Dickens  was  more  in  the  faculty  for  creating  types 
than  in  the  vein  of  humor. 

It  is  said  that  Galdos'  first  suggestion  for  his 
famous  series  of  National  Episodes  came  from  the 
noted  French  literary  twins,  Erckjiiann  and  Chat- 
rian,  who  are  still  considered  by  many  to  be  a  single 
person,  largely  owing,  perhaps,  to  the  usual  coupling 
of  the  names  by  a  hyphen.  P'or  this  purpose  he  re- 
sorted to  a  most  rigorous  plan  of  documentation; 
"old  charters,  old  letters,  old  newspapers  were  col- 
lected by  him  with  the  minuteness  of  a  German 
archivist,"  writes  Fitzmaurice-Kelly;  "no  novelist 
was  ever  more  thoroughlv  equipped  as  regards  the 
details  of  his  period.  Trafalgar,  the  first  volume  of 
the  Episodios  Nacionales,  appeared  in  1879.  •  •  • 
The  author's  aim  was  to  write  the  national  epic  of 
the  nineteenth  century  in  prose,  and  he  so  com- 
pletely succeeded  that,  long  before  the  first  series 


SPAIN  79 

ended  in  1881,  he  took  rank  among  the  foremost 
novelists  of  his  time.  A  second  series  of  Episodios 
Nacionales  .  .  .  was  brought  to  a  close  in  1883, 
and  was,  like  its  predecessor,  a  monument  of  in- 
dustry and  exact  knowledge  of  realism  and  romantic 
conception;  and  he  carried  on  the  Episodios  Na- 
cionales into  a  fourth  series,  raising  the  total  of  the 
volumes  to  forty.  In  fecundity  and  power  of  creat- 
ing character,  Perez  Galdos  vies  with  Balzac." 

The  National  Episodes,  however,  represent  but 
a  part  of  Perez  Galdos'  prose  labors;  indeed,  there 
are  not  lacking  Spanish  critics  who,  though  they 
acknowledge  the  supreme  virtues  of  the  Episodes, 
find  the  most  interesting  of  the  man's  novels  in  his 
contemporary  series — the  books  dealing  with  the 
social  and  religious  problems  of  modern  life.  Here, 
too,  his  astonishing  faculty  of  observation,  his  skill 
in  construction,  his  bold  assault  upon  current  evils, 
his  unflagging  inventiveness,  attest  the  genius  of 
Galdos.  One  wonders  whether  Fitzmaurice-Kelly, 
the  noted  English  Hispanophile,  still  considers  the 
prose  labors  of  Galdos  broad,  but  lacking  solidity. 
At  any  rate,  this  characterization,  which  appeared 
in  his  history  of  Spanish  literature,  is  not  repeated 
in  the  article  upon  Perez  Galdos  to  be  found  in  the 
latest  edition  of  the  Britannica. 

Among  the  best  of  the  contemporary  novels  are 
Dona  Perfecta  (1876),  which  has  been  used  as  a 
text  book  in  our  schools,  and  has  been  translated 
into  English;  Gloria  (1877);  La  Familia  de  Leon 
Roch  (1878),  Angel  Guerra  (1891).  To  these  many 
would  wish  to  add  the  exquisite  Marianela  (known 
here  in  at  least  two  editions  for  school  use,  as  well 


80         THE  DRAMA  OF  TRANSITIOV 

as  a  translation  into  English),  aiui  Fortunata  v 
Jacinta} 

Galdos'  theatrical  career  really  begins  with  the 
production  of  Reaitdad^  which  was  adapted  for  the 
stage  from  two  of  his  prose  works,  Realidad  antl  Lm 
lucopiita.  The  next  year  (189J)  witnessed  the  pro- 
duction of  La  Loca  de  La  Casa^  which  was  followed 
by  Im  de  San  ^uiutiu^  Los  Condeuados^  and  Vol- 
untad.  In  1896  Dona  Perjecta  was  translated  to  the 
scene.  Five  years  later  occurred  one  of  the  most 
important  theatrical  representations  in  the  history 
of  the  Spanish  stage:  the  production  of  the  much- 
discussed,  much-maligned,  much-fought,  and  vitu- 
perated EJectra^  of  which  more  in  a  moment.  In 
1902  came  Alma  v  Vida;  next  year,  Mariucha;  19O4 
saw  the  dramatization  of  the  excellent  novel,  FJ 
Abiielo^  which  has  been  likened  to  Kitig  Ijear  for  its 
theme.  In  191 5  came  the  socialistic  Celia  en  los 
infeinios  and  San  Simdn^  and  in  191 6,  when  the 
author  was  already  past  seventy,  FJ  TacaTio  Salo- 
mdn. 

Manuel  Bueno,  the  well-known  Madrid  theatrical 

'  Professor  J.  D.  M.  FortI,  .1  -i  his  rrcrnt  Main  Currenli  of  Sfunish 

Ltieraturc,   chaJlPUKCS    Galdos'  in    characteristically    fair,    out«ix)lccn 

w-ords.     After  admittitiK  that  (.  ,.  rr^  evils,  and  that  he  does  not  lack 

courajie,  the  noted  scholar  adrls  that  "iuo  LOuraRe  is  not  one  worthy  of  unqualified 
praise,  for  it  is  on  occasion  danRcroiisly  like  the  couraRC  of  the  fanatic.  He  aaaaib 
fanaticism  in  the  rcliKious  constitution  of  his  fellow  Spaniards  and  he  exposes 
himself  to  the  charge  that  he  is  himself  a  fanatic  in  his  methods  of  doins  so. 

■'The  Dofia  J'nfecta,  which,  out  of  all  his  novels,  has  made  most  noise  abrtxad, 
illustrates  what  happens  when  his  antipathies  take  one  of  their  most  determined 
forms,  anti-clericalism.  In  this  book  he  Rives  but  a  perverted  idea  of  reliRion,  of 
Catliolicism  as  practiced  in  Spain.  No  one  can  prove  a  rule  of  life  by  basing  his 
arguments  upon  the  abnormal,  the  monstrous,  the  exceptional  in  human  nature; 
and  asain.  the  intrinsic  Roodness  of  a  reliRious  ?>-stem  is  not  vitiated  by  the  ex- 
cesses of  a  few  fanatic  and  unintelligent  believers."  Ford  advances  similar  objec- 
tions to  other  of  the  Gald6s  romances.  Here,  of  course,  the  reader  is  more  or  less 
unconsciously  swayed  by  his  stand  upon  the  matters  under  discussion.  Thou- 
sands of  readers  cannot  view  the  books  in  this  light;  perhaps  the  critic  docs  not 
exist  who  can  read  controversial  works  with  utter  impartiality  and  impersonality. 
Until  criticism  shall  have  been  made  a  science  (which  means  never)  such  imper- 
sonality will  be  a  word  for  critics  to  toy  with.  Vet  in  works  of  a  controversial 
nature  it  is  doubly  obligator^'  upon  the  author  to  play  his  game  fairly.  There  is 
food  for  thought,  too,  in  Ford's  statement  that  Pereda,  in  those  novels  in  which 
he  tried  to  refute  Galdos'  theses,  "u-as  too  hide-bound  in  his  own  coaservatism 
to  meet  the  other  novelist  effectively  on  his  own  ground." 


SPAIN  81 

critic,  who  is  by  no  means  always  inclined  to  op- 
timistic views  upon  the  national  drama,  softens  per- 
ceptibly in  the  presence  of  Galdos'  plays.  For  the 
sake  of  the  grandiose  themes  and  their  treatment  he 
is  ready  to  forgive  him  things  that  could  not  be 
pardoned  in  a  writer  of  less  merit.  He  agrees  at 
once  that  Galdos  has  brought  novelistic  methods  to 
the  theatre,  but  what,  he  asks,  of  that?  Who  has 
decreed,  outside  of  critics  who  look  upon  books  and 
the  stage  as  material  for  text-book  utterances,  that 
all  analysis  must  be  confined  to  the  novel  and  all 
synthesis  to  the  stage,  and  that  never  the  twain 
must  meet?  Galdos'  plays  belie  that  assertion,  and 
that  is  why  his  work  for  the  stage  is,  "like  La  Celes- 
tina^  an  intermediate  form  between  theatre  and 
novel,  possessing  the  fascinating  fibre  of  the  first 
and  the  noble  eloquence  of  the  second."  One  must 
admire,  above  all,  the  boldness  of  the  man,  he  tells 
us,  in  thus  flouting  the  conventional  canons  of 
stage-technique.  Galdos  refused,  moreover,  to  pan- 
der to  the  taste  for  blatant  rhetoric  that  Echegaray 
knew  so  well  how  to  satisfy.  With  all  his  faults, 
Bueno  receives  Galdos  into  the  theatrical  fold^ — he 
did  from  the  first,  when  others  were  finding  fault 
and  when  the  public  was  turning  a  cold  shoulder — 
with  these  affectionate  words:  "We  are  with  Galdos 
body  and  soul,  because  his  work  has  opened  to  us  a 
road  which,  were  it  not  for  this  great  writer,  would 
be  irreparably  closed  to  us." 

It  is  the  brilliant  stylist  and  exquisite  conteur 
Ramon  Perez  de  Ayala  who  has  erected  Galdos 
into  a  quasi-Shakesperean  figure,  at  the  same  time 
tearing  Benavente  rudely  from  the  pedestal  upon 
which  contemporary  criticism  has  placed  him.    With 


82         THE  DRAMA  OF  TRANSITION 

reference  to  both  men,  the  author  of  that  quaint 
and  fascinating  book  Be/armino  v  Apolonio  is  well 
worth  knowing;  he  is,  to  say  the  least,  original,  and 
his.  commentary  is  such  a  welcome  relief  from  the 
pompous  maunderings  of  so  many  of  his  inferiors, 
that  it  is  a  tonic,  even  when  one  is  compelled  to  dis- 
agree with  him.  It  is  true  that  his  clever  remarks 
are  often  founded  upon  the  process  of  giving  new 
meanings  to  old  words  and  thus  polishing  up  old 
thoughts, —  that,  despite  his  airy  manner,  he  has 
little  new  to  say.  It  is  true  that  he  has  a  habit  of 
treating  his  subjects  in  tripartite  divisions  that  re- 
call both  Cicsar's  Gallia  and  the  Ciceronian  phrase- 
ology. It  is  tnie,  too,  that  by  reading  out  of  Gal- 
dos'  plays  a  mass  of  theory,  he  reads  into  them  an 
artistic  value  that  is  absent.  He  talks  much  of 
impersonality,  yet  tells  us  little  of  Galdos  and  much 
of  himself.  He  does  not  criticize  or  reveal  the  play 
under  consideration  so  much  as  use  it,  and  avowedly, 
as  the  basis  of  commentary.  Now,  no  one  has  a 
quarrel  with  this  sort  of  thing.  Its  sole  justification 
is  the  quality  of  the  man  who  does  it,  and  in  Perez 
de  Ayala,  whether  as  critic,  poet,  or  novelist,  there 
is  a  distinctly  personal  savor  that  creates  art  even 
when  it  leaves  one's  opinions  unaltered. 

To  this  critic  Galdos'  work  is  all  nineteenth  cen- 
tury Spain.  "In  Don  Benito  Perez  Galdos,  as  in 
Shakespeare,  it  is  clearly  to  be  seen  that  the  author 
has  conceived  the  drajnatic  work  as  a  whole  in  which 
at  every  moment  the  action  is  co-ordinated  with  the 
place  where  it  occurs,  the  character  with  the  phvs- 
ical  appearance  of  the  personage,  the  dialogue  with 
the  attitude  and  the  composition,  the  phrase  with 
the  manner,  the  voice  with  the  gesture, — in  short. 


SPAIN  83 

the  spiritual  with  the  plastic  element.  Without 
this  condition  there  is  no  great  dramatic  art." 
Again:  "This  fusion  of  the  figure  with  the  milieu 
and  the  infiltration  of  the  ambient  with  the  per- 
sonage, in  the  manner  of  osmosis  and  endosmosis 
between  the  spirit  and  the  environment,  is  a  salient 
characteristic  of  the  most  original  and  intense  of 
modern  literary  art,  the  Russian.  It  is  likewise  the 
dominant  trait  of  the  Galdosian  production  of  the 
entire  second  epoch  or  manner,  whether  through  in- 
fluence of  Russian  literature,  or  through  deter- 
minism of  the  contemporary  sensibility,  I  do  not 
know."  Galdos,  according  to  this  view,  crowns  the 
Spanish  novel  as  Cervantes  starts  it;  he  reforms 
Spanish  drama  as  Cervantes  tried  to,  in  the  direc- 
tion of  simplicity  and  realism,  although  "Cervantes 
did  not  succeed  in  becoming  the  chief  dramatist  of 
his  day,  and  Galdos  is,  without  dispute,  the  greatest 
of  ours  and  one  of  the  first  in  any  age  or  place." 

In  what  appears,  to  most,  the  exaggeration  of  this 
last  citation  there  is,  none  the  less,  a  kernel  of 
measurable  truth.  Galdos'  plays,  unlike  Eche- 
garay's,  do  develop  from  a  core  of  passion  that  is 
the  play  itself.  They  reveal  a  healthy  disregard  for 
the  conventions  of  stage  technique.  They  do  not 
yield  readily  to  the  arrogant  confines  of  the  pro- 
scenium, and  tend  to  overflow  the  banks  of  the  ac- 
cepted form.  But  in  so  doing  they  exercise  a  liber- 
ating influence;  they  rebel,  rather  than,  like  Eche- 
garay's  numerous  monstrosities,  conform.  They  are 
the  plastic  revelation  of  the  thought  that  they  con- 
tain. Often  the  personages  are  so  humanly  con- 
ceived and  presented  that,  like  all  significant  human 
beings,  they  become  symbols — symbols  not  in   the 


84         THE  DRAMA  OF  TRANSITION 

sterile  sense  of  allegory,  but  in  the  sense  of  mean- 
ingful life.  It  is  thus  possible  for  Perez  de  Ayala,  in 
considering  Galdos'  Lm  Loca  de  la  Casa  (1893)  to  in- 
dicate Pcpete  as  the  incarnation  of  egoism  and  caj>- 
italism  overshooting  the  mark,  and  Victoria  as  his 
socialistic,  counterbalancing  wife.  Incidentally,  the 
critic  points  out  that  Pepete's  "Nietzschcism"  pre- 
cedes by  several  years  Clarin's  introduction  of  the 
German's  name  to  Spain.  It  is  because  of  Gald6s' 
power  to  create  the  illusion  of  humanity  that  .Ayala 
may  declare,  "Perhaps  you  sympathize  more  with 
some  than  with  others  of  the  figures  or  personages 
in  Cervantes;  but  it  is  certain  that  their  father,  in 
the  moment  of  engendering  them,  sympathizetl  with 
all  alike.     We  will  say  the  same  of  Galdos*  figures." 

So,  in  his  various  plays — there  are  about  a  score 
— Galdos  is  viewed  as  tlefending  the  conservation  of 
the  species  and  the  reason,  the  instinct  (conservation) 
favoring  the  individual  versus  the  species  and  the 
reason  favoring  the  species  versus  the  individual. 
"Such  is  the  tragedy  of  human  history  and  the  life 
of  man:  the  perpetual  struggle  between  these  two 
just  causes."  .And  what  is  to  reconcile  these  irrecon- 
cilables?  The  will,  by  which  we  are  to  understand 
the  love  of  love. 

Manuel  Bueno,  though  not  the  stylist  that  Ayala 
is,  can  speak  of  Galdos  in  the  same  reverential  terms. 
"Galdos'  art  fascinates  me,"  he  has  written  in  his 
criticism  of  Afariuc/iny  "fascinates  me  because  it  an- 
swers to  deep  aspirations  of  youth,  because  it  trans- 
lates the  restless  spirit  of  our  times,  because  it  is 
boldly  destructive  and  frank  without  hypocrisy." 
In  Alariucha  we  have  a  spiritual  sister  to  Ibsen's 
Nora  and  Hedda;  as  she  is  a  rebel,  so  is  the  play 


SPAIN  85 

regarded  as  an  essay  in  Nietzschean  transmutation 
of  values. 

Of  El  Abuelo  (19O4),  Bueno  speaks  in  terms  of 
extravagance  unmatched  by  Perez  de  Ayala.  "Ham- 
let, spying  upon  the  words  and  the  gestures  of  his 
mother  and  his  uncle  to  track  the  origin  of  the 
crime,  is  less  tragic  than  the  Count  of  Albrit  seeking, 
through  the  smiling  adolescence  of  Nell  and  Dolly, 
the  tell-tale  indication  of  the  maternal  guilt." 
Dolly  becomes  an  "Antigone  more  beautiful  within 
the  ideal  than  the  Greek  virgin  herself."  And  the 
play  as  a  whole  is  "the  greatest  work  produced  by 
the  contemporary  national  theatre.  If  it  were  per- 
missible to  assign  rank  to  works  of  art,  I  should 
place  it  between  King  Lear  and  Brand;  that  is,  the 
most  intense  of  Shakespeare  and  the  deepest  of 
Ibsen.  The  thinker  and  the  artist  have  reached, 
in  El  Abuelo^  the  loftiest  height  accessible  to  genius." 

Such  admiration,  such  panegyric,  may  be  under- 
stood without  being  shared.  There  is  no  question 
as  to  the  hold  which  Galdos  exerts  upon  the  liberal 
minds  of  his  nation.  In  much  of  what  his  com- 
mentators write,  the  artist  is  confused  with  the 
social  personality.  Perhaps  one  must  be  such  a 
Spaniard  as  Ayala  or  Bueno  to  behold  in  El  Abuelo 
the  tragic  eminence  assigned  to  it  in  the  radiant 
words  just  quoted.  Surely  one  may  range  himself 
among  Galdos'  admirers  without  assenting  to  what 
seems  rhetorical  expansion  rather  than  critical  com- 
prehension. 

Let  us  pause  for  a  few  moments  upon  El  Abuelo 
{The  Grandfather),  which  dates  from  1904,  three 
years  after  Electra.  It  is,  in  essence,  almost  a  dram- 
atization of  the  Tennysonian  lines, 


86         THF.  DRAMA  (W  TR  WSITION 

Kind  hearts  arc  more  than  coronets, 
And  simple  faith  than  Norman  blood. 

The  Count  of  Albrit,  a  [iro'ial  nobleman  fallen 
upon  evil  days,  is  tortured  by  a  maiklcning  doubt 
as  to  which  of  his  granddaughters,  Dolly  or  Nelly, 
is  the  real  tlaughter  of  his  deceased  son  and  which 
the  spurious.  He  retujns  to  his  former  manor  at 
La  Pardina  to  meet  his  daughter-in-law  Lucretia, 
who  at  first  cannot  bring  herself  to  tell  him  the 
truth.  He  deciiles  to  watch  the  children  closely  for 
a  sign  of  the  noble  blood  to  reveal  itself  by  word  or 
deed.  At  first  perplexed,  he  decides  finally  u[X)n 
Dolly.  Vet  it  is  the  selfish  Nelly  who  is  the  real 
one,  as  the  disgruntled  Senen  discloses  in  a  moment 
of  anger  against  l.ucretia,  and  as  Lucretia  herself 
tells  her  confessor.  I'he  Count,  fairly  cra/ed,  for 
he  has  come  to  love  Dolly,  decides:  "Now  I  see  that 
human  thought,  human  calculations,  and  human 
plans  are  as  nothing!  All  these  are  nothing  but 
rust  that  corrodes  and  decays;  what  endures  is  that 
which  dwells  within!    The  soul  can  never  die!" 

What   does  one  see   in    the   play,   approaching   it 
without  a  knowledge  of  its  importance  to  the  modern 
Spanish  drama  and  equally  ignorant  of  the  exalted 
opinion    in    which    Galdos    is    held    by    Ayala    and 
Bueno?    To  speak  the  humble  truth, —  a  fairly  well 
constructed    piece,    containing    two    or    three    gen- 
uinely moving  scenes,  and  somewhat  marred  by  the 
use  of  such   conventional   makeshifts   as   "papers," 
"proofs,"   and  revelations  made   by  crossed  under- 
lings.   There  are  unnecessary  "asides";  unnecessary, 
not  because  the  "aside"  should  be  ruthlessly  rooted 
out   of  contemporary   drama   (I    do     not  believe  it 
need  be),  but  because  in  this  case  nothing  that  they 


SPAIN  87 

convey  could  not  with  equal  ease  and  greater 
effectiveness  have  been  conveyed  by  facial  expres- 
sion and  gesture.  These  defects  are  compensated 
for,  and  richly,  by  the  very  intensity  of  Galdos'  con- 
ception; he  saw,  what  Echegaray  may  never  have 
imagined,  that  there  is  a  place  upon  the  stage  for 
calmness,  for  passion  that  does  not  tear  itself  to 
tatters.  But  Shakespeare,  Hamlet?  Let  us  be  mod- 
erate, gentlemen!  Echegaray,  upon  the  production 
of  El  Gran  Galeoto,  was  hailed  as  a  second  Shake- 
speare. Maeterlinck,  too,  after  the  presentation  of 
La  Princesse  Maleine^  was  brought  by  Octave 
Mirbeau  to  the  attention  of  a  skeptical  world  with 
the  same  crushing  praise.  And,  as  we  shall  pres- 
ently note,  Benavente's  camp-followers  have  not 
lagged  behind  the  procession  of  puffery.  No.  It  is 
not  here  that  Galdos'  importance  lies.  Both  Eche- 
garay before  him  and  Benavente  after  have  helped 
to  obscure  his  service  to  a  stage  cluttered  with 
"efectismo" — the  easily  attained  sensationalism  of 
external  effects  and  coups  de  theatre.  Galdos  had 
a  glimpse  of  what  the  contemporary  dramatist,  at 
his  best,  is  rapidly  attaining.  In  a  day  when  "tech- 
nique" was  everything,  he  despised  it.  Nor  was  it 
because  he  could  not  have  written  in  the  Scribe- 
Sarcey  tradition;  the  genius  capable  of  creating  his 
novelistic  world  was  easily  equal  to  a  task  that  is 
assimilated  without  too  much  trouble  by  any  com- 
petent college  student  to-day.  It  was  because  he 
felt  its  restraining  influence,  because  drama  to  him 
meant  something  more  than  an  exercise  in  form  and 
genre.  So  that,  if  the  semi-confined  outlook  of 
Echegaray  may  be  traced  back  to  Calderon,  the 
plays  of  Galdos  belong  rather,  like  those  of  Ben- 


88         THK  DRAMA  OF  'IKANSiriON 

avente,  in  the  tradition  of  Lope  de  \  cga.  That  way 
lies  a  formal  treedoni  which  is  the  mirror  of  an  inner 
liberation. 

La  de  San  i^uintin  (enti;lished  as  7'/t<r  Duchfss  of 
San  i^uentin)  belongs  to  the  earlier  Galdosian  plays, 
1894.  The  work  deals  chiefly  with  the  love  of  young 
Victor  for  the  Duchess  Rosario,  a  year  younger  than 
he.  She  is  an  aristocrat  fallen  into  financial  diffi- 
culties; he  is  the  suppxjsed  son  of  Don  Cesar  de 
Buendia,  a  tight-fisted,  lecherous,  semi-invalid  of 
fifty-five.  Through  the  Marquis  de  Falfan  de  los 
Godos,  who  has  been  wronged  by  Don  Cesar,  Rosario 
comes  into  letters  j^roving  that  Victor  is  not  the 
natural  son  of  Don  Cesar.  This  she  makes  known, 
choosing  Victt)r,  the  socialist  iilealist,  in  preference 
to  Don  Cesar,  the  crafty  widower  who  has  made 
love  to  her.  The  happy  couple,  representing  the 
union  of  enlightened  aristocracy  and  the  rising 
proletariat,  look  to  the  future  with  confidence. 
Where  old  Don  Jose,  almost  a  nonagenarian,  sees 
the  death  of  a  world,  \'ictor  and  Rosario  behold  the 
dawn  of  a  new  era. 

The  vision  of  the  play  is  that  which  inspires  most 
of  the  author's  labors;  the  whole  is  vivified  by  Gal- 
dos'  passion  for  truth  to  self,  for  tnith  at  all  costs, 
for  social  progress.  There  are  suggestions  of  Ibsen's 
Pillars  of  Society^  as  well  as  The  IVild  Duck. 

But  one  cannot  help  wishing  that  these  unnec- 
essary asides,  these  epistolary  imbroglios,  these  mys- 
teries of  parentage  and  melodramatic  revelations, 
together  with  the  other  trappings  of  a  style  that 
is  outmoded  because  it  never  sank  its  roots  into 
passional  genuineness,  were  absent.  Galdos  did  not 
look  upon  lite  as  does  Mr.  Galsworthy,  for  example. 


SPAIN  89 

The  Englishman  sees  it  deeply,  sees  it  steadily  and 
perhaps  whole,  yet  is  prone  to  treat  it  as  if  it  laid 
itself  out  in  patterns  of  easily  grasped  symmet- 
ricality;  there  seems,  at  times,  and  especially  in 
such  a  later  work  as  The  Skin  Game^  a  readiness  to 
employ  stenciled  detail  in  the  elaboration  of  a  pat- 
tern that  is  meant  to  be  anything  but  stenciled.^ 
Something  of  this  same  incongruity  informs  the 
major  portion  of  Galdos'  plays.  It  is  particularly 
disconcerting  in  such  a  piece  as  Electra,  ipoij  which 
created  a  veritable  furore  in  the  intellectual  life  of 
the  nation.  It  was  a  personal  as  much  as  an  ar- 
tistic triumph.  As  was  to  be  expected,  the  con- 
servatives launched  their  propaganda  against  the 
subversive  drama.  It  is  recorded  that  "in  one  city 
the  actors  were  obliged  to  leave  the  theatre  before 
the  performance  in  order  to  escape  violence  at  the 
hands  of  the  clericals.  In  another,  the  members  of 
the  company  were  refused  lodging  and  were  obliged 
to  spend  the  night  in  the  streets.  Even  from  the 
pulpit  and  the  confessional,  says  Galdos  himself, 
war  was  waged  against  the  work."^ 

•  This  same  effect  is  produced  upon  me  by  Galsworthy's  The  Mob,  a  play 
which  seems  to  prove  that  not  even  the  most  noble  attitude  can  make  a  good 
piece  of  art  unless  the  life  of  art  itself  be  respected.  There  is  more  than  one  appeal 
in  the  play  to  that  very  mob  whose  political  and  emotional  unreason  is  pointed 
out  by  the  author;  as  a  playwright  he  appeals  to  that  very  mob  spirit  in  his 
audience,  with  the  effects  of  passing  parades,  with  the  coincidence  of  Hubert's 
death  in  battle  at  the  moment  of  the  first  national  victory,  with  the  foreshadowing 
of  that  death  in  the  dream  recited  by  Hubert's  wife.  Galsworthy  begs  part  of  the 
question  by  making  the  nation  at  war  with  a  little  opponent.  Would  More's  posi- 
tion have  been  less  logical  if  the  fight  were  an  equal  one?  And  is  it  the  mob  that 
starts  wars  or  ends  them?  His  shorter  pieces  reveal,  in  more  marked  degree, 
something  of  the  same  incongruity  that  I  am  trying  to  explain  in  Galdos.  (See, 
for  example.  The  First  and  Last,  with  its  sudden  entrances,  burned  "papers" 
(Echegaray!),  union  of  aristocracy  and  slums,  double  suicide,  all  inside  of  a  one- 
act  play  that  requires  three  scenes  with  thirty  hours  between  I  and  II  and  two 
months  between  II  and  III,  and  the  curtain  lowered  in  the  third  scene  to  denote 
the  passing  of  three  hours.  Yet  Phelps  can  say  that  "he  has  never  producedany- 
thing  negligible."     (Essays  on  Modern  Dramatists.     New  York,  1921.) 

'  Contemporary  Spanish  Dramatists:  Plays  by  Perez  Galdos,  Linares  Rivas, 
Marquina,  Zamacois,  Dicenta,  and  the  Quintero  brothers,  translated  with  an 
introduction  by  Charles  Alfred  Turrell.     Boston,  1919,  page  11. 

For  Galdos'  The  Duchess  of  San  Quentin  as  well  as  for  Echegaray's  The  Great 
(joUoto,  and  Guimera's  Daniela  see  Masterpieces  of  Modern  Spanish  Drama,  edited 
by  Barrett  H.  Clark,  Cincinnati,  1922. 


90         THE  DRAMA  OF  TRANSITION 

Here  again  we  encounter  the  anonuily  of  a  fresh 
outlook  upon  life  with  an  outmoded  technique, — 
an  anomaly  that  seems  to  mirror  the  transitional 
position  of  Galdos  in  both  Spanish  drama  and 
Spanish  thought.  The  play  is  an  attack  upon  the 
imposition  of  the  religious  lite  upon  healthy  young 
womanhood  and  the  means  used  to  bring  this  about. 
(In  this  play,  for  example,  Klectra  is  told  that  she  is 
Maximo's  sister.)  Yet,  despite  all  the  opposition 
brought  to  bear,  Maximo,  a  widower  with  two  chil- 
dren, marries  Klectra.  His  successful  suit  may  be 
taken  to  symbolize  the  triumph  of  science  over 
clericalism  in  Spain.  The  third  act,  representing 
Maximo's  laboratory,  is  an  excellent  piece  of  stage 
symbolism  done  in  the  best  manner;  the  action  and 
the  symbol  here  are  part  and  parcel  of  each  other; 
just  as  the  metals  are  fused  in  the  laboratory,  so 
are  Maximo  and  Electra  fused  in  their  affection, 
and  so  has  Galdos  fused  the  component  elements 
into  an  organic  unity.  It  is  easy  to  dismiss  the  last 
scene  but  one,  in  which  Electra  beholds  her  mother, 
as  a  visible  representation  of  the  maiden's  con- 
science or  inner  debate,  but  there  are  other  qualms 
that  seize  the  critic.     Here  is  the  brief  scene: 

The  Shade:  I  am  your  mother,  anti  I  come  to  calm 
the  anxieties  of  your  loving  heart.  My  voice  will  restore 
peace  to  your  conscience.  No  bond  of  nature  unites  you 
to  the  man  you  have  chosen  for  a  husband.  That  which 
you  heard  was  an  invention  dictated  by  affection  to  bring 
you  into  our  company  and  to  the  peace  of  this  holy  house. 

Electra:  Oh,  Mother,  what  consolation  you  bring 
me! 

The  Shade:  I  am  telling  you  the  truth,  and  I  give  it 
strength  and  hope.     .Accept,  my  daughter,  as  a   test  of 


SPAIN  91 

the  temple  of  your  heart,  this  transitory  seclusion,  and 
bear  no  ill  will  to  those  who  brought  you  here.  .  .  . 
If  marital  love  and  the  pleasures  of  the  family  call  your 
soul,  allow  yourself  to  abandon  this  sweet  attraction  and 
do  not  pretend  to  a  holiness  that  you  cannot  attain. 
God  is  everywhere.  ...  I  do  not  know  how  to  find 
Him  outside  of  here.  .  .  .  Seek  Him  in  the  world 
along  paths  better  than  mine,  and  .  .  .  {The  Shade 
is  silent  and  disappears  as  the  voice  of  Maximo  is  heard.) 

Maximo  {in  the  door):    Electra! 

Electra  {running  toward  him) :     Ah ! 

Pantoja  {at  the  right):     My  daughter,  where  are  you? 

Marq.uis:     Here,  with  us. 

Maximo:     She  is  ours. 

Pantoja:     Are  you  running  away  from  me? 

Maximo:  No,  she  is  not  running  away.  .  .  .  She 
has  come  to  life. 

We  have  seen  that  Galdos'  critics  fall  naturally 
into  the  habit  of  symbolistic  interpretation,  and  that 
Galdos  himself  so  creates  his  characters  that  they 
live  as  symbols  of  flesh  and  blood,  not  literary  al- 
gebra. So  here  Pantoja  may  be  regarded  as  rep- 
resenting the  clerical  party;  Cuesta,  modern  busi- 
ness; the  Marquis,  the  ancient  aristocracy,  "joining 
hands  with  Science  (Maximo)  to  save  Spain  (Electra) 
and  bring  her  to  a  new  life."  It  should  be  empha- 
sized, however,  that  the  play  is  a  human  progress 
absolutely  independent  of  any  such  interpreta- 
tion. And  it  is  a  sad  commentary  upon  Spanish 
life  that  when  Spaniards  do  revolt,  they  must  re- 
volt, in  their  art,  against  conditions  and  views  that 
elsewhere  belong  rather  to  the  history  of  mental 
liberation  than  to  the  catalogue  of  man's  contem- 
poraneous obstruction.  ...  I  write  this,  and 
then    think    of   recent    happenings    in    the    United 


92         THK  DRAMA  OF  TRANSITION 

States.     Wherefore  let  silence  he  the  better  part  of 
condescension. 

The  remaining  plays  of  Galdos  are  in  similar  re- 
volt against  bigotry,  against  social  convention,  be- 
numbing tradition;  Ce/ia  en  los  infiei'yios^  '9' 5.  is 
an  addition  to  the  proletarian  drama  imperfectly 
projected  by  Dicenta;  Sor  Simona^  •9'5>  is  a  proc- 
lamation of  love  as  the  begetter  of  peace,  of  hu- 
manity as  the  only  real  country  of  the  world.  .And 
yet  Storm  Jameson  could  write  that  "Spanish 
dramatists,  with  the  rare  exception  of  Dicenta,  are 
not  in  revolt  against  anything,  least  of  all  against 
life."  Rather  than  Dicenta,  a  distinctly  minor 
figure,  that  rare  exception  should  have  been  Benito 
Perez  Galdos.  Surely  he  was  not  in  revolt  against 
life,  but  just  as  surely  was  he  a  rebel  against  the 
conventions  and  traditions  that  impede  its  freer 
play.  He  did  not  create  for  the  stage  a  form  fully 
adequate  to  the  artistic  illumination  of  that  spir- 
itual rebellion,  perhaps  because  he  did  not  see  fully 
into  its  deeper  implications.  At  any  rate,  his  form 
impresses  one  as  intermediate;  he  fought  evils  rather 
than  illuminated  a  new  day.  He  was  held  back  by 
the  very  past  that  he  opposed.  He  was  himself  too 
deeply  rooted  in  the  soil  out  of  which  he  sought  to 
rise.  This,  rather  than  any  addiction  to  special 
methods,  explains  his  shortcomings  as  a  dramatist. 
WTien  Ayala  and  Bueno  exalt  him  to  the  skies,  it  is 
the  person  and  the  idealist  who  is  worthy  of  the 
praise,  not  the  dramatic  artist.  Art  is  a  province  in 
which  most  of  us  are  far  nobler  than  our  works.  If 
we  would  be  nobler  still,  as  all  lovers  of  beauty  are 
noble,  we  should  be  ready  to  read  the  distinction. 


SPAIN  93 

"THE  GENERATION  OF  '98" 

It  is  significant  that  when  the  so-called  "genera- 
tion of  '98"  rose  in  determined  rebellion  against  the 
trammelling  past  of  Spain,  venting  its  venom  upon 
Echegaray  and  all  that  he  stood  for,  they  not  only 
excepted  Galdos  from  that  past,  but  in  a  large  sense 
built  upon  him.  In  a  similar  situation,  the  youthful 
Italians  dealt  similarly  with  Giovanni  Verga,  who 
was  excepted  from  the  condemnation  heaped  chiefly 
upon  the  druggingly  sweet  D'Annunzio  as  the  con- 
tinuator  and  chief  abettor  of  the  national  vices: 
cult  of  woman  and  worship  of  the  past.  It  is  a  wise 
generation  of  youths  that  looks  beyond  dates  and 
remembers  that  Youth  is  an  attribute  of  the  spirit 
rather  than  a  mark  upon  a  calendar. 

Perhaps  the  most  laconic  form  in  which  the  re- 
volt of  these  young  men  has  found  expression  is  the 
characteristically  succinct,  tart  quintet  of  para- 
graphs that  Baroja  gives  to  it  in  his  Youth  and 
Egolatry: 

During  the  years  1898  to  1900,"  he 
writes,  "a  number  of  young  men  suddenly  found 
themselves  thrown  together  in  Madrid,  whose  only 
rule  was  the  principle  that  the  immediate  past  did 
not  exist  for  them. 

"This  aggregation  of  authors  and  artists  might 
have  seemed  to  have  been  brought  together  under 
some  leadership,  and  to  have  been  directed  to  some 
purpose;  yet  one  who  entertained  such  an  assump- 
tion would  have  been  mistaken. 

"Chance  brought  us  together  for  a  moment,  a 
very  brief  moment,  to  be  followed  by  a  general  dis- 
persal.   There  were  days  when  thirty  or  forty  young 


94         THE  DRAMA  OF  TRANSITION 

men,  apprentices  in  the  art  of  writing,  sat  art)und 
the  tables  in  the  old  Cafe  de  Madrid. 

"Doubtless  such  gatherings  of  new  men,  eager  to 
interfere  in  and  influence  the  operations  of  the 
social  system,  yet  without  either  the  warrant  of 
tradition  or  any  proved  ability  to  do  so,  are  com- 
mon upon  a  larger  scale  in  all  revolutions. 

"As  we  neither  had,  nor  could  have  had,  in  the 
nature  of  the  case,  a  task  to  perform,  we  soon 
found  that  we  were  divided  into  small  groups,  and 
finally  broke  up  altogether."' 

This  is  far  from  telling  the  whole  story,  of  course, 
but  Haroja,  in  pointing  out  the  lack  of  cohesion  and 
the  subsequent  dispersal  of  the  youthful  icono- 
clasts, touches  upon  two  vital  considerations. 

The  defeat  of  Spain  by  the  L'nitcd  States  in  1898 
was  rather  a  goad  to  the  rebellion  of  the  intel- 
lectuals than  the  cause  of  the  overturn.  Dissatis- 
faction had  for  a  long  time  disturbed  the  hegemony 
of  the  bourgeois.  Had  not  Costa  proclaimed  that 
the  sepulchre  of  the  Citl  must  be  locked  under 
double  key?  And  was  not  the  sense  of  realism — the 
true  heritage  of  the  literary  Spaniard — already  keen 
in  the  liberal  Galdos  as  well  as  the  orthodox  Pereda? 
But  the  intense  pessimism  of  the  innovators,  be- 
sides returning  to  this  healthy  sense  of  reality,  ac- 
complished far  more.  They  threw  out  of  the  window 
the  cluttering,  vacuous  rhetoric  of  the  Castilian 
orator;  they  sought  and  found  a  less  turbid,  clearer, 
more  plastic  poetry;  they  opened  wide  the  nation's 

'  See  the  English  version  by  Jacob  S.  Fassett,  Jr.,  and  Frances  L.  Phillips, 
New  York,  1920,  with  a  pertinent  introduction  by  Hcnr>'  L.  Mencken. 

For  the  case  against  the  "generation  of  '9S,"  see  the  prodigious  Historia  de  la 
Lengua  y  Literalura  Caslellana,  comprendidos  los  aulores  hispano-americanos,  by 
D.  Julio  Cejador  y  Frauca,  \'ol.  X.  Madrid,  1919.  The  author  slashes  his  way 
through  a  thicket  of  quotation.^  repetitions,  and  objurgations  until,  perhaps  wearied 
by  his  own  protests,  he  almost  sells  his  case  through  a  frank  admission  of  the 
benefits  conferred   upon  Sp£inish  literature  by  the  generation  he  is  combating. 


SPAIN  95 

doors  and  let  the  winds  of  Europe  blow  lustily- 
through  the  house;  they  scandalized  the  neighbors 
with  all  manner  of  new-fangled  notions.  Desultory 
as  their  labors  were,  unconsolidated  by  community 
of  purpose  or  awareness  of  direction,  they  reshaped 
the  national  literature.  "In  the  literature  of  Spain," 
wrote  Azorin  (Jose  Martinez  Ruiz),  one  of  the  most 
noted  of  the  rebels,  "the  generation  of  '98  represents 
a  renaissance;  more  or  less  ample,  or  narrow,  if  you 
will,  but  when  all  is  said  and  done,  a  renaissance. 
.  .  .  A  renaissance  is  simply  the  fecundation  of 
the  national  thought  by  foreign  thought."  And  so, 
upon  the  minds  of  Dario,  Valle-Inclan,  Baroja, 
Unamuno,  Maeztu,  Ortega  y  Gasset,  Bueno,  and 
Benavente  played  the  minds  of  the  greater  Euro- 
peans. Through  these  representatives  of  the  new 
Spain  entered  D'Annunzio,  Ibsen,  Tolstoi,  Amiel, 
Spencer,  Verlaine,  Nietzsche,  and  the  honorable  rest. 
Nietzsche,  Verlaine,  and  Gautier  were  general  rather 
than  specific  influences;  each  man,  for  himself,  re- 
sponded to  specific  stimuli.  For  Baroja  there  were 
Dickens,  Poe,  Balzac;  for  Benavente,  there  were 
Shakespeare,  Musset,  and  the  modern  French  dram- 
atists. The  Institucion  Libre  de  Ensenanza  became 
a  veritable  symbol  of  "national  masochism,"  whose 
aim  was,  in  Cejador's  words,  to  "de-hispanize  and 
de-Christianize  Spain." 

The  revolt  against  the  theatre  was  crystallized  in 
the  manifesto  issued  against  Echegaray  at  the  time 
when  the  rest  of  the  nation  was  celebrating  his  re- 
ception of  the  Nobel  Prize. 

Benavente,  as  one  of  the  eager  '98-ers,  became  a 
participant  in  the  intellectual  life  of  Europe;  his 
prose — even  apart  from  his  dramas — shows  a  sensi- 


96         THE  DRAMA  OF   TRANSITION 

tiveness  to  shades  of  thought  and  an  exquisite 
aesthetic  adjustment  that  are  the  chief  contribution 
of  the  restless  youths  among  which  he  grew  to 
artistic  maturity.  Everything  that  the  theatre  of 
Echegaray  is,  the  theatre  ot  Henavente  is  not.  His 
work,  which  is  not  to  be  fully  understood  without  a 
knowledge  of  the  insurgents  whose  ranks  he  once 
fought  in,  forms  one  of  their  chief  claims  upon  historic 
glory.  Just  as  Baroja,  in  the  novel,  is  seemingly 
the  apostle  of  a  philosophic  ccntrifugalism,  so  in  the 
drama  is  Henavente  the  shifting,  disintegrating  Pro- 
tean, as  instable  as  the  life  he  pictures,  constant  only 
in  his  inconstancy.  And  to  cap  the  brief  but  lively 
history  of  the  drama's  rebels  among  the  '98-ers, 
Benavente  himself  only  yesterday  received  the  very 
Nobel  Prize  that  was  the  signal  for  Echegarav's 
condemnation,  and  received  it-  so  impatient  are  the 
young  and  so  intent  upon  their  own  accession  to 
fame — at  the  very  moment  that  he  was  the  target 
of  powerful  thrusts  and  attacks  from  which  he  does 
not  emerge  unscathed. 

JACINTO  BENAVENTE 

The  most  outspoken  as  well  as  the  best-informed 
of  the  anti-Benaventians  is  that  same  Perez  de 
Ayala  in  whom  Galdos  finds  his  panegyrist.  He  does 
not  deny  the  dramatist  "uncommon  talent,  inex- 
haustible acuteness,  fluency,  and  elegance  of  lan- 
guage, copious  repertory  of  rhetorical  and  scenic 
artifices.  But  all  these  gifts  together  entail  par- 
ticularly vituperable  and  harmful  consequences,  for 
they  are  pressed  into  the  service  of  a  mistaken  con- 
ception of  dramatic  art."    Their  fruit  in  Benavente, 


SPAIN  97 

according  to  this  analysis,  is  "pharasaism,  sophism, 
conceptism,  which  are  to  ideas  what  the  press  is  to 
words."  And  Benavente's  versatiHty?  "Examin- 
ing, as  a  whole,  in  panoramic  fashion,  the  complete 
theatrical  production  of  Don  Jacinto  Benavente,  we 
become  at  once  aware  that  the  landscape  before  us 
is  a  strange  region  whose  flora  and  fauna  correspond 
neither  to  the  torrid  nor  the  frigid  zone,  but  to  some 
epicene,  transitional  zone  in  which  the  climate 
changes  arbitrarily  from  hot  to  cold  and  from  cold 
to  hot  without  ever  reaching  great  extremes." 
.  .  .  "Benavente's  theatre  is  .  .  .  precisely 
anti-theatrical,  the  opposite  to  dramatic  art.  It  is 
a  theatre  of  middle  terms,  without  action  or  passion, 
and  therefore  without  motivation  or  characters, 
and,  what  is  worse,  without  genuine  reality.  It  is  a 
merely  oral  theatre,  which,  for  its  perfect  scenic 
realization,  does  not  require  actors  in  the  true 
sense.     .    .     ." 

In  the  later  plays  of  the  Spaniard,  Perez  de  Ayala 
discovers  a  growing  apostolic  fervor,  as,  for  ex- 
ample, in  La  Ciudad  alegre  y  confiada,  which  is 
dubbed  "not  drama  but  staged  politics."  La  Prin- 
cesa  Bebe,  to  him,  is  "neither  passion  nor  fantasy." 
La  Malquerida  (played  here  by  Nance  O'Neil  as 
The  Passion  Flower)  becomes  a  mere  "detective 
play"  {drama  policiaco).  The  Governor  s  Wife  is 
dismissed  as  a  piece  that  bored  the  public,  who 
laughed  only  at  the  suggestive  quips.  Not  even  the 
quality  of  Benavente's  salaciousness  is  to  Ayala's 
taste,  for,  "granted  the  public's  acceptance  of  a 
gross  reference  to  sex,  a  cultured,  well-balanced 
spectator  will  be  less  disgusted  by  the  merry,  frank, 
natural,  sound  allusions,  as  in  the  Greek  and  Latin 

7 


98         THE  DRAMA  OF  TRANSITION 

classics,  in  our  classics,  in  the  writers  of  the  Italian 
renaissance,  in  Shakespeare,  than  by  the  moody, 
veiled,  morbid  allusions,  which  suggest  morose,  sin- 
ful pleasures."  Again,  apropos  of  Los  Cachorros^ 
"his  drama,  in  my  sincere  but  perhaps  mistaken 
opinion,  does  not  proceed  immediately  from  life; 
it  is  intellectual,  literary,  theatre  of  the  theatre. 
Hut  within  this  category  of  merely  literary  drama, 
I  believe  that  Bcnavcnte,  in  view  of  his  talent, 
acuteness,  and  culture,  is  many  cubits  higher  than 
similar  authors  (for  example,  Linares  Rivas),  and 
that  his  works  admit  no  comparison  with  the  others 
of  the  same  species." 

From  such  opinions  as  these  to  the  appreciations 
of  Benavente  by  John  Garrett  I'nderhill,  who  dis- 
covered him  to  F.nglish  readers  and  playgoers,  and 
whose  translations  arwd  their  accompanying  intro- 
ductions are  so  easily  accessible'  as  to  render  any 
account  of  the  playwright's  life  unnecessary  in  these 
pages,  is,  in  more  ways  than  one,  a  leap  of  three 
thousand  miles  across  the  sea.  Mr.  I'nderhill  is 
fully  aware  and  duly  appreciative  of  the  change 
wrought  by  Benavente  upon  the  Spanish  stage. 
"Onlv  a  master  of  the  theatre  could  be  so  inde- 
pendent of  its  parade;  rather  he  has  espoused  every 
reform  by  which  the  stage  might  be  broadened  or 
made  more  sincere.  The  theatre  has  been  his  work- 
shop, and  after  each  period  of  productivity  he  has 
withdrawn  from  public  view  .  .  .  returning 
ac;ain  with  a  fresh  orientation  and  a  keener  sense  of 
living  values.  'Ah!'  he  exclaims,  in  the  second 
volume  of  his  Table  Talk,  Met  us  have  done  with 
all  counterfeits,  of  which  the  most  common  in  the 

•  Plays  6y  Jacinto  Benartnte.     Two  series.     New  York,  1917,  1919. 


SPAIN  99 

theatre  are  these:  the  confusion  of  the  vapid  with 
the  hterary,  of  the  dull  with  the  profound,  of  the 
extravagant  with  the  new,  the  banal  with  the  poetic, 
the  gross  with  the  courageous  and  bold.  All  these 
equivocations  invariably  end  in  one  other — an 
empty  house,  which  is  explained  by  saying  that  the 
play  failed  because  it  was  art,  and  the  public  was 
unable  to  appreciate  art.  But  the  true  art  of  the 
theatre  is  to  do  good  business,  and  to  do  good  busi- 
ness you  must  do  good  art.  Shakespeare  and 
Moliere  were  both  managers,  and  as  managers  both 
made  a  great  deal  of  money.'^ 

"No  dramatist  is  less  theatrical,  yet  none  has 
written  more  theatrical  plays.  .  .  .  The  real 
dramas  of  Benavente,  in  which  he  has  expressed  his 
impressions  of  life  without  hesitation  or  reserve,  and 
made  a  distinctive  contribution  to  the  theatre,  are 
far  more  numerous"  (i.  e.,  than  his  secondary  one- 
act  pieces,  musical  plays,  translations  from  the  Eng- 
lish, Catalan,  and  French  and  occasional  pieces.) 
.  .  .  "Benavente  has  .  .  .  tried  his  hand  at 
almost  every  genre,  and  he  has  been  successful  in 
them  all — peasant  dramas  and  the  tragedy  of  blood, 
so  long  associated  with  Spain  in  the  minds  of  for- 
eigners, satires  of  provincial  and  metropolitan  so- 
ciety, of  the  aristocracy,  dramas  of  the  middle  class, 
court  comedy  in  the  most  subtle  and  refined  of 
forms,  in  which  by  birth  and  breeding  the  person- 
ages are  all  royal.  He  has  written  romantic  com- 
edies and  dramas,  rococo  spectacles,  imaginative 
fairy  plays  of  genuine  poetic  worth.  Only  the  play 
in  verse  has  remained  unattempted,  implying,  as  it 

>  A  brief  but  effective  refutation  of  such  an  oft-repeated  fallacy  as  occurs  in 
Benavente's  talk  of  Shakespeare  and  Moliere  is  made  by  Ludwig  Lewisohn  in  hia 
The  Drama  and  the  Stage,  pages  16,  17. 


100       THE  DRAMA  OF  TRANSITION 

no  doubt  does,  through  its  diction  a  certain  artifi- 
ciality in  the  very  pnxress  of  thought.'  In  all  these 
different  genres  he  has  moved  with  consummate 
ease,  without  the  suggestion  of  effort,  until  the 
drama  of  character  has  seemed  the  most  facile  and 
casual  of  arts." 

In  Benavente's  style  Mr.  Underbill  discovers  one 
of  the  most  complex  and  highly  personal  in  litera- 
ture. The  Spaniard  is  concerned  not  so  much  with 
ideas  as  with  thou^dit  in  process  of  formulation. 
Plot,  as  such,  is  of  secondary  moment,  while  the 
tendency  of  the  man's  art  is  altogether  "away  from 
the  plastic  toward  the  insubstantial,  the  transparent. 
What  he  had  accomplished  with  satire  he  next 
essays  with  j^lot,  turning  his  attention  to  its  sec- 
ondary and  suggestive  values,  to  the  inferences 
which  wait  upon  them,  and  the  atmosphere  which 
they  create."  All  this  is  interesting  not  only  for 
its  illumination  of  Benavente's  method,  but  for  its 
analogy  with  procedure  that  is  loosely  labeled  P2x- 
pressionist  and  associated  with  the  young  German 
experimenters  rather  than  with  Benavente  in  Spain 
or  O'Neill  in  the  United  States.  The  futuristic 
currents,  it  may  be  added  in  passing,  flow  weak 
upon  the  Spanish  stage;  they  are  almost  confined  to 
the  prose  and  poetry  of  such  groups  as  the  Ultra, 
with  an  affinity  to  the  Dadas  and  the  host  of  pullu- 
lating "isms"  that  run  the  continuous  literary 
vaudeville  show  of  Europe. 

Truth — let  us  be  careful  with  that  chameleon- 
word — does  not  always  lie  in  the  middle.  But  in 
the  case  of  Benavente,  if  Underbill  does  him  some- 

'  Recent  Italian  dramatists  have  in  practice  disproved  thH  theory.  There  is 
no  valid  argument  against  the  poetic  play.    All  it  needs  is — poets. 


SPAIN  101 

thing  more  than  justice,  surely  Ayala  does  him 
something  less.  Men  do  not  write  fourscore  plays 
of  unvarying  merit.  If  they  are  Latins  they  suffer, 
even  more  than  Anglo-Saxons,  who  are  fond  of 
considering  themselves  a  colder  race,  from  the  un- 
due praise  and  the  undue  depreciation  of  friends 
and  enemies;  they  acquire  a  quantitative  outlook 
upon  output;  they  mistake  theory  for  execution, 
theme  for  projection.  So  that  we  may  agree  at 
once  that  not  every  play  by  Benavente  is  worth 
reading  or  producing;  that  critics  like  Ayala  have 
been  unjustly  harsh,  as  critics  like  Bueno  and 
Andres  Gonzalez  Blanco  have  been  unjustly  eulo- 
gistic. ''Shakespeare  returned  to  life,"  exclaims 
Gonzalez  Blanco, ^  writing  of  the  play  Senora  Ama^ 
"would  sign  this  drama  with  pride!"  (Shades  of 
the  immortal  Will,  what  comparisons  are  committed 
in  thy  name!)  Donina,  declares  Manuel  Bueno, 
referring  to  one  of  the  protagonists  of  La  Noche  del 
Sdbado  {Witches'  Sabbath)  "is  a  creature  that  recalls 
the  women  of  Shakespeare,"  whereupon,  in  his  en- 
thusiasm, he  makes  of  Portia  the  daughter  of  Shy- 
lock  I^  Now  Witches'  Sabbath  is  a  highly  original 
and  interesting  production, — one  of  the  cycloramic 
spectacles  that  form,  for  some,  the  chief  contribu- 
tion of  Benavente  to  the  technical  renovation  of 
modern  Spanish  drama.  But  why  burden  it  under 
such  a  mountain  of  praise.^  Nor,  on  the  other  hand, 
should  the  excess  of  his  critics  be  allowed  to  obscure 
the  genuine  values  of  the  dramatist. 

Benavente,   as   is   now  well   known,   was,   in   his 
earlier  days,   a   traveler  with   a   circus,   perhaps   a 

'  Los  Dramaturgos  Espanoles  Conlempor&neos,  p.  131  et  seq.    Valencia. 
'  Teatro  Espaiwl  Contempordneo,  pp.  144-151.    Madrid. 


102       THE  DRAMA  OF  TRANSITION 

performer  in  the  ring.  His  entire  f)iitput  for  the 
theatre  may  be  viewed  as  a  vast  circus  ring  with 
Henavente  as  sprightly,  antic  master,  cracking  his 
w  hip  and  summoning  in  dazzhng  succession  a  motley 
of  cKnvns,  now  cynical  with  the  sneer  of  satire,  now 
sad  with  the  traditional  heritage  of  the  mummer's 
melancholy,  now  provocatively  admonitory,  now 
nonchalantly  anarchical,  but  ever  the  conscious 
clown  of  the  ring.  There  is,  in  the  man's  most 
characteristic  labors,  a  sophistication  that  almost 
militates  against  depth  of  passion;  whether  he  weeps 
or  he  cries,  he  is  never  so  absorbed  that  he  cannot 
pause  for  introspection,  for  self-analysis.  It  is  no 
accident  that  his  beginnings,  toward  the  end  of  the 
nineteenth  century,  are  matle  in  satire,  and  that  his 
most  famous  work,  Los  hitereses  Creados  (played  in 
the  United  States  as  The  Bo)ids  of  Interest  and  in 
England  as  The  Bias  of  the  If'orld)  is  satire  so  sub- 
limated that,  from  viewing  mankind  as  a  tangled 
string  of  puppets,  it  takes  the  logical  step  of  con- 
verting them  frankly  into  puppet  figures  upon  the 
stage.  Remember  that  Benavente's  plays,  like 
Baroja's  novels,  for  all  the  wadrilenismo  of  both 
writers,  are  centrifugal;  they  proceed  from  a  com- 
mon center,  but  do  not  return;  they  elude  ready 
classification  because  they  were  born  of  a  spirit 
hostile  to  the  artificial  ease  of  order.  There  is 
neither  morality  nor  immorality  in  Benavente,  who 
is  amoral,  and  Martinez  Sierra  is  right  in  changing 
his  figure  when  he  says  that  Benavente's  work  re- 
sembles him  as  if  it  were  himself  "reflected  in  a 
mirror  ...  or  rather,  in  the  flowing  crystal  of 
a   brook."^     To   characterize    the    man's   work — as 

'  See  his  Introduccion  to  the  Nelson  edition  of  three   Benavente  plays  ILos 
Interests  Creados,  Al  Natural,  Rosas  de  Olofio). 


SPAIN  103 

apart  from  whatever  artistic  values  we  may  assign 
to  it — one  needs  words  that  do  not  stand  still,  that 
mock,  that  snicker,  that  brood,  that  shift  forever 
restlessly  like  the  colored  glass  of  the  kaleidoscope, 
into  patterns  new  and  alluring.  The  stupid  itera- 
tion of  Echegaray,  who  could  not  even  in  El  Gran 
Galeoto  abandon  his  shabby  artifices,  gives  way  to 
colorful  variety;  even  when  we  know  that  the  new 
patterns  are  but  bits  of  tinted  glass  thrown  together 
at  a  venture  by  a  turn  of  the  kaleidoscope,  we  are 
grateful  for  the  change. 

It  is  not  necessary,  even  were  it  here  feasible,  to 
go  over  every  play  that  Benavente  has  written. 
Some  of  them  are  avowed  trifles  that  fulfill  their 
purpose  of  enlivening  the  passing  hour;  nor  should 
one  overlook,  even  among  these,  such  a  deep  little 
episode  as  La  Verdad  {The  Truth) ^  in  which  a  young 
lady,  placed  in  a  position  where  she  may,  if  she 
desires,  overhear  in  hiding  what  her  sweetheart  has 
to  say  about  her  to  his  boon  companions,  finally 
refuses  the  opportunity.  For,  if  there  is  a  hypocrisy 
of  virtue,  may  there  not  be,  too,  a  hypocrisy  which 
assumes  vices?  And  whatever  her  sweetheart  says, 
whether  complimentary  or  derogatory, — how  is 
she  to  know  which  words  carry  the  real  truth?  Then 
there  is  the  bonbon  called  El  Principe  ^ue  Todo  Lo 
Aprendid  En  Los  Libros  {The  Prince  Who  Learned 
Everything  Out  of  Books)^  written  for  the  Children's 
Theatre  he  founded,  together  with  the  actor  Porro- 
d6n,  in  191 1.  This  is  a  charming  little  juvenile 
satire,  not  without  application  to  adults,  containing 
mild  gibes  at  the  court,  at  book-learning,  and  the 
"practical"  life,  and  constituting,  in  certain  minor 
respects,  a  young  folks'  Don  Quixote.    For  the  prince 


104       TflF  DRAMA  OF  TRANSITION 

believes  all  he  has  read  in  the  fairy  books, — only  in 
this  case  the  strength  ol  his  belief  carries  him  through. 
Tonino,  the  buffoon,  with  his  stomachic  greed,  is  the 
Sancho  of  the  play  as  La  Vieja,  the  prince's  good 
fairv,  is  the  Diilcinea  who  "comes  true." 

The  characteristic  Benavente  is  to  be  found 
rather  in  such  arresting  performances  as  La  Gober- 
nadora  (1901),  Lm  Noche  del  Sdbado  (190]),  Lm 
Priucesa  Bebe  (published  in  1905,  but  withheld  from 
the  stage  until  1909),  Los  Intereses  Creados  (1907), 
and  l^  Malqiierida  (191J).  In  these  his  satire,  his 
irony,  are  at  their  most  pungent;  his  wit  is  at  its 
sharpest,  his  skill  at  suggesting  psychology  through 
a  minimum  of  words  ami  actions  most  fine.  Around 
these,  and  the  few  others  that  might  be  grouped 
with  them,  are  clustered  a  score  of  minor  works, 
illuminative  of  his  best  rather  than  illustrative  of  it. 
As,  for  example.  El  Automd'jil  (1902),  which  followed 
fast  upon  Ahjia  Triuujante  of  the  same  December. 
If  I  mention  The  Automobile  at  all,  it  is  because  in 
this  fairly  clever  farce  I  seem  to  find  a  sort  of  "re- 
hearsal" for  the  writing  of  the  widely  acclaimed 
Bonds  of  Interest  of  five  years  later.  Its  essential 
theme  is  the  same  as  that  of  Los  Intereses  Creados; 
Margarita,  former  sweetheart  of  Federico,  steals  him 
away  in  an  automobile  just  bought  from  the  Mar- 
quis by  Hilario,  father  of  Federico's  affianced,  Maria 
Luisa.  A  scandal  results,  and  the  engaged  couple 
break  oflF,  though  at  bottom  still  in  love.  Marga- 
rita is  a  romantic,  stage-struck  madcap;  she  half 
convinces  herself  that  she  will  ennoble  her  char- 
acter by  "renouncing"  Federico  (a  la  Dame  aux 
Camelias!),  and  before  she  is  through,  she  has  so 
entangled  the  virtuous  men  and  ladies  that  they  are 


SPAIN  105 

forced  to  accept  in  silence  her  fanciful  and  theatrical 
explanation  of  Federico's  "escapade."  Here,  as  in 
the  later  play,  cleverness  devises  its  own  extrica- 
tion; there  are  a  number  of  funny  scenes,  but  the 
distance  between  this  and  The  Bonds  of  Interest  is 
continental;  in  The  Automobile  the  persons  are 
largely  puppets;  in  Los  Intereses  Creados^  the  pup- 
pets are  more  than  persons,  living  a  life  that  is  their 
own  and  a  symbolic  life  dependent  not  upon  ar- 
bitrary, parallel  meanings,  but  upon  the  significance 
that  radiates  from  all  genuine  personalities.  Bueno, 
a  fellow  '98-er  of  Benavente's,  has  been  extravagant 
in  praise  of  the  other  piece,  Alma  Triunfante.  "It 
is  the  elegy  of  life's  nothingness,"  he  writes,^  "of  the 
tragic  void  of  our  souls."  Perhaps.  But  Bueno  is 
too  prone  to  discuss  ethical  implications  rather  than 
the  aesthetic  index  of  the  play,  which  is  not  very 
high.  A  woman,  crazed  by  the  loss  of  her  child,  has 
been  in  the  asylum  for  five  years,  during  which  time 
her  husband  has  a  child  by  another.  This  she  dis- 
covers when  she  returns  to  her  house.  Rather  than 
admit  her  knowledge,  however,  she  would  feign  a 
return  of  insanity,  so  as  to  remove  herself  from  his 
path.  He,  sincerely  penitent,  is  led  to  confess  all 
to  her,  whereupon  she  accepts  the  daughter  as 
partly  hers  and  pardons  all  concerned.  Her  doctor 
has  been  deceived,  while  the  priest  has  known  the 
truth  all  along,  through  the  wife's  confessor,  and  it 
is  through  him  that  she  is  led  to  the  more  human 
conclusion.  The  doctor-priest  balance  swings  evenly 
between  science  and  religion,  which  are  reconciled 
in  an  all-embracing  human  love.  As  here,  so  in 
Rosas  de  Otono  (1905),  pardon  and  hope  seem  the 

'  Teatro  Espafiol  Contempordneo,  pages  137-144. 


106     thp:  drama  of  transition 

woman's  lot.  There  is  sympathy  tor  woman,  yet 
she  is  depicted  as  being  too  weak  in  will  to  accom- 
plish what  her  intellect  approves.  She  may  rebel, 
but  gives  in  at  last,  while  man  purchases  forgive- 
ness at  the  price  of  a  little  hollow  flattery.  Here, 
as  in  La  Fiierza  Bruta  (1908),  Martinez  Sierra  be- 
holds support  of  bourgeois  morality;  there  is  a  closer 
analogy,  however,  between  Brute  Force  and  .'lima 
Triunjante^  wherein  the  emphasis  is  placed  rather 
upon  sacrifice  than  upon  pardon.  And  those  who 
assert  that  Benavente  is  never  "preachy"  would  do 
well  to  consult  the  close  ot  lui  Fhci-zh  Bruta.  To  this 
group  we  may  assign  Los  Malhcclwrcs  del  Bien  {The 
Evil-Doers  oj  Good^  I905)>  which  is  not,  as  some  have 
maintained,  an  anti-clerical  diatribe.  It  is  a  satire 
against  the  essential  immorality  of  a  certain  type 
of  charity-giving  as  prevalent  in  England  as  in 
France,  in  Ciermany  as  in  the  United  States, —  a  con- 
descending patronage  that  robs  its  beneficiaries  of 
will,  manhood,  personality. 

Benavente,  in  an  interview,  is  reported  to  have 
expressed  a  choice  ot  Sehora  Ama  (1908)  as  his  best 
play.  F'or  that  reason,  as  well  as  because  of  the 
commendations  that  Gonzalez  Blanco  and  his  ilk 
have  laid  upon  it  with  a  trowel,  it  is  worth  while 
dwelling  upon  for  a  paragraph.  It  is  in  three  acts. 
The  protagonist  is  much  in  love  with  her  erring 
husband;  she  overlooks  his  numerous  transgressions 
and  even  prides  herself  upon  his  conquests,  for  if 
he  is  so  popular  with  the  ladies,  then  all  the  more 
credit  to  her  for  having  won  him.  .  .  .  But  when 
a  child  begins  to  grow  in  her  bosom  she  becomes 
strict,  for  no  bad  example  must  be  set  before  the 
boy  (so  she  wills  the  sex)  after  he  is  born.     .     .     . 


SPAIN  107 

Once  again  she  forgives  her  husband,  assuring  him 
that  heaven  has  done  the  same.  There  is  Httle 
effectiveness  to  the  play  whether  as  psychology, 
action,  character  portrayal,  or  narrative.  "This  is 
worse  than  among  the  Moors!"  exclaims  Rosa  in 
the  first  act.  "Then  there's  no  religion  here,  no 
morality,  no  shame .^"  .  .  .  "Quit  your  fussing!" 
is  Julita's  reply.  "There  are  simply  men  and 
women.  .  .  ."  Yes,  but  for  an  advanced  play- 
wright like  Benavente,  too  many  of  the  men  reap 
the  pleasures  of  vice,  while  the  women  are  left  with 
the  solace  of  virtue, — a  sweet  word  that  one  finds 
in  the  dictionaries.  Yet  who  shall  blame  overmuch 
if  he  depicts  his  people  as  they  are?  These  are  not, 
after  all,  his  best  plays.  They  are  not  the  ones  he 
wrote  in  the  mood  of  Princess  Bebe^  of  which  he 
declared:  "Sometimes  I  say  what  I  think,  some- 
times I  have  regard  for  the  opinions  of  others." 
No;  in  these,  he  has  a  certain  "regard  for  the  opinions 
of  others,"  which  is  good  business  and  ratifies  what 
the  author  has  written  in  connection  with  art  and 
money-making. 

Rather  let  us  return  to  the  sahent  series  that 
starts  with  La  Gobernadora.  In  these  one  imagines 
one  discovers  Benavente  in  the  core,  not  upon  the 
rim,  of  his  work.  The  satire  and  the  irony  in  them 
are  not  the  detached  commentary  that  may  be  found 
in  his  lesser  social  pieces;  they  are  the  overtones  of 
the  action  and  the  personages,  vibrating  with  the 
fundamental  tone  and  coloring  its  timbre.  The 
very  frames  merge  with  the  pictures  they  contain 
until  they  dissolve  in  the  variegated  detail.  It  was 
Benavente,  not  Echegaray,  that  Shaw  should  have 
"discovered"  circa  1903.     Far  more  versatile  than 


108       THE  DRAMA  OF  TRANSITION 

Pirandello,  the  Spaniard  more  resembles  his  English 
contemporary  in  his  radiant  technical  insouciance, 
his  ventilation  of  current  notions,  his  ready  wit,  his 
intellectual  curiosity.  One  looks  in  vain  through 
Benavente,  however,  tor  Barbaras,  Candidas,  pre- 
dacious Anns  and  their  life-force  brood.  One  looks 
in  vain  for  meticulous  stage-directions,  which  Ben- 
avente avoids,  and  logorrheic  prefaces.  The  Span- 
iard lacks  almost  entirely  the  Irishman's  ethical  pre- 
occupations, though,  curiously  enough,  no  one  has 
come  away  from  Shaw  with  a  hampered  sense  of 
personal  liberty.  Benavente's  is  not  a  discursive 
world;  it  is  rather  a  compact,  pyrotechnic  institu- 
tion where  the  rockets  glare,  the  wheels  spin  a  while, 
and  then  the  display  is  over.  He  dazzles  the  mind 
and  leaves  the  heart  curiously  indifferent, — perhaps 
because  he  is  himself  an  indifferent  spectator.  Once 
again,  like  Baroja,  he  produces  the  impression  of  a 
man  who  has  sat  down  upon  the  banks  of  life  to 
watch  the  stream  flow  by.  He  does  not,  like  Shaw, 
plunge  into  the  waters  and  get  himself  gloriously 
wet;  he  is  like  those  shapely  maidens  who  expend 
their  effort  upon  a  beautiful  bathing  suit  that  is 
never  meant  to  be  kissed  by  the  waves.  But — and 
this  is  the  important  consideration — he  has  pro- 
jected into  his  best  works  just  this  instable,  aloof, 
yet  inquisitive  attitude  toward  life,  and  drama  can 
do  little  more  than  vivify  an  attitude. 

The  governor's  wife  of  the  play  thus  named  is 
one  of  Benavente's  wise  brood  who  works  her  will 
upon  the  surrounding  society  through  a  subtle 
knowledge  of  human  nature.  "She  has  made  her 
husband,  and  she  knows  how  to  recall  every  detail 
of  the  making  that  she  may  gain  some  new  end. 


SPAIN  109 

She  can  switch  back  and  forth  between  two  deci- 
sions as  one  who  flies  gracefully  from  the  trapeze  of 
opportunism  to  the  trapeze  of  self-interest.  Next 
to  nothing  in  the  life  of  the  town  escapes  her  inter- 
ference. She  plays  off  the  townsfolk  to  her  ceaseless 
advantage.  She  can  keep  the  proper  secretary,  guide, 
counsellor,  and  friend  to  her  husband — and  agree- 
able lover  to  herself.  And  all  this  she  does  with  a 
marvelous  savoir-faire^  a  bird-like  vivacity,  an  in- 
imitable grace,  the  lightest  of  innuendo.  Like  a 
knowing  lark,  she  scales  singing  the  heavens  of  self- 
interest  and  self-will.  If  for  a  moment  she  flutters 
downward,  this  Dona  Josefina  still  charms  piquantly. 
With  reason  she  tempts  comediennes.  Mrs.  Fiske 
should  play  her  in  America. 

"This  precious  pair  are  well  companioned — in  the 
gubernatorial  'palace' — by  a  bent-shouldered,  soft- 
spoken  old  henchman,  who  knows  every  byway  of 
duplicity,  hypocrisy,  and  self-interest  in  Moraleda; 
in  the  town  itself,  by  a  whole  troop  of  fitting  deni- 
zens. Across  the  scene  comes  and  goes  'the  richest 
man  in  Moraleda,'  who  would  order  its  morals  and 
manners,  its  downsittings  and  uprisings  according 
to  his  own  notions  and  for  his  own  profit,  and  who  is 
by  no  means  choice  or  considerate  in  his  methods. 
The  spectator  salutes  him  as  one  well  known  in  the 
Moraledas  even  of  pure  and  young  America.  Be- 
hind him  trail  a  gabbing  wife,  a  shallow,  pettish 
daughter.  Near  her  are  two,  three,  and  four  gal- 
lants, pretending  to  the  ways  of  the  frivolous,  know- 
ing world  as  it  appears,  say  the  300  miles  from  the 
nearest  capital.  Again  the  spectator  salutes  them 
gladly;  ten  chances  to  one  he  has  encountered  them 
no  farther  away  than  our  own  Middle  \^'est.     In 


no       THE  DRAMA  OF  TRANSITION 

the  middle  distance  or  farther  into  the  offing  a 
tradesman,  an  actor,  a  manager,  the  rector  of  the 
university,  women  'snippy'  and  women  vacuous; 
while  here  and  there  passes  and  repasses  a  distinc- 
tively Spanish  character—  for  the  most  part  folk  ot 
the  bull  ring.  All  these  dwell  together  busily,  even 
happily,  in  Moraleda,  because  they  are  all  tarred 
with  the  same  stick — the  stick  with  which  Bena- 
vente  first  prods  and  smears  the  governor,  the  gov- 
ernor's lady,  and  the  rich,  the  mean,  the  arrogant 
Don  Baldomero.  The  end  of  the  stick  is  sharp,  the 
acid  on  it  bites  through  the  tar.  Details  aside,  the 
comedy  of  The  Governor  s  U  ije  is  as  true  as  truth, 
and  as  savory,  in  Moraledas  the  world  over.  Out 
of  the  tares  of  human  nature  Benavente  has  brought 
to  bloom  a  flower  of  the  theatre.  Into  fifty  novels 
Balzac  had  need  to  pack  his  'human  comedy.' 
The  Spaniard  has  compressed  his  into  one  brief 
play."^ 

Even  more  kaleidoscopic  than  La  Gobemadora  is 
the  IV itches'  Sabbath  {La  Noche  del  Sdbado)y  sub- 
titled by  the  author  "a  novel  for  the  stage  in  nve 
tableaux."  But  this  scenic  novel  does  not  employ 
the  technique  of  the  Galdosian  play,  in  which  the 
author  of  the  National  Episodes  deliberately  flouted 
theatrical  convention  and  mingled  genres  in  a  manner 
to  astound  the  academic.  Neither  does  it  revert  to 
the  habit  of  some  of  Benavente's  lesser  plays,  in 
which  the  plot  is  narrated  rather  than  presented  in 
action  and  word.  It  is  dramaturgically  akin  to  the 
Expressionistic  methods  that  it  preceded;  to  such 
slices  of  life   as   Molnar's  Liliom;   to   the   irregular 

>  H.  T.  Parker,  in  the  Boston  Evening  Transcript,  May  19,  1920.  on  a  day  follow- 
ing the  performance  of  the  play,  in  Underhills  translation,  by  the  Harvard  Dra- 
matic Club,  Cambridge,  Mass. 


SPAIN  111 

stage  patterns  that  Wedekind  employed  before 
Kaiser,  Hasenclever,  and  the  other  new  Germans, 
that  Hauptmann  has  used  in  such  recent  plays  as 
Der  Weisse  Heiland^  and  that  one,  William  Shake- 
speare by  name,  used  in  blissful  ignorance  of  our 
contemporary  "isms."  It  is  a  free  form  that  is  the 
result,  or  rather  the  other  aspect,  of  a  free  concep- 
tion. Shall  it  irk  us  that  the  work  is  not  Spanish 
in  atmosphere  or  psychology?  The  action,  supposed 
to  take  place  in  a  winter  resort  upon  the  Riviera, 
/'situated  near  the  boundary  between  Italy  and 
France,"  has,  in  reahty,  a  less  local  setting,  and  the 
boundaries  are  more  exactly  those  between  no  two 
countries,  but  between  you  and  me.  With  his  early 
fondness  for  the  lector  whom  Drinkwater  but  yes- 
terday brought  to  our  stage  in  his  Abraham  Lincoln^ 
Benavente  prologues  his  play — as  he  is  later  to  do 
with  The  Bonds  of  Interest — with  a  brief,  poetic 
prelude. 

It  is  Saturday  night.  Earth,  sea,  and  sky  blend  in 
refulgent  harmony — light,  waves,  mountain  tops,  and 
groves  smile  with  the  freshness  of  a  world  new-born, 
ignorant  of  sorrow  and  of  death.  Gods  and  heroes, 
nymphs  and  fawns  should  inhabit  this  enchanted  shore; 
love  and  wisdom  alone  are  worthy  to  contemplate  its 
beauty.  The  idylls  of  Theocritus  and  the  eclogues  of 
Virgil  breathe  the  spirit  of  its  poesy,  or  if  perchance  a 
poet  of  our  unquiet  time  may  turn  to  it  to  glorify  his 
melancholy,  let  it  be  the  divine  Shelley,  worshiper  of 
the  eternal  harmony  of  Beauty,  Truth,  and  Good,  who 
refused  to  set  bounds  and  limits  to  the  infinite,  adoring 
God  in  all  his  works.  The  ritual  of  his  worship  shall  be 
the  passionate  litany  of  the  holy  poet  of  Assisi,  the 
universal  lover,  who  greeted  all  things  with  his  song  of 


112        THE  DRAMA  OF  TRANSITION 

ardent  flame:  Brother  Sun,  Brother  Sea,  Brother  Birds, 
Brother  Wolf — all  brothers! 

Into  this  enchanted  scene,  by  Nature  so  lavishly 
endowed,  comes  man.  It  is  the  fashionable  winter  season 
— d  la  mode — man  has  chosen  his  earthly  paradise  well; 
for  paradise  indeed  it  is.  He  flees  from  the  cold  and  the 
chill  of  the  North,  but  he  brings  the  chill  of  his  life  with 
him;  he  flees  from  his  life,  but  his  life  follows  and  over- 
takes him.  pAery  pathway  beneath  his  feet  opens  into 
an  inferno  like  Dante's,  above  whose  portals  is  inscribed 
the  legend: 

Through  me  the  way  is  to  the  city  dolcnt. 
Through  me  the  way  is  to  eternal  dole. 
Through  me  the  way  among  the  people  lost. 

Whereupon  the  motley  tale  begins.  .A  sordid 
story  of  a  mother,  Imperia,  mistress  of  Prince  Flor- 
encio,  and  Donina,  daughter  of  Imperia,  who  loves 
Nunu  but  cannot  win  him.  Nunu,  knowing  his 
power  over  Donina,  tries  to  trade  her  to  her  mother's 
paramour.  Donina,  trapped  in  a  low  resort  and 
defending  herself  against  the  Prince's  attack,  slays 
him.  For  a  while  she  is  kept  alive  by  the  attentions 
of  Nunu, — attentions  purchased  by  her  mother, 
unknown  to  the  languishing  daughter, — until,  the 
secret  of  his  assiduity  out,  she  dies,  while  her  mother 
leaves   with   the  other  Prince,   Michael   Alexander. 

Plot  in  Benavente  is  of  itself  next  to  nothing.  In 
his  dramatic  pointillage  the  detail  is  almost  all. 
Now  it  is  a  snatch  of  dialogue:  "We  become  impos- 
sible socially,"  says  Leonardo,  "not  because  of  what 
people  know  about  us,  but  because  of  what  they 
imagine  we  may  know  about  them."  "Precisely," 
repHes  Etelvina.  "We  ought  always  to  say  what 
we  know  of  everybody,  not  out  of  malice,  but  in  the 


SPAIN  113 

interest  of  truth  and  good  feeling.  All  of  us  are 
made  of  the  same  clay.  Virtue  is  merely  relative — 
it  consists  of  those  vices  one  does  not  possess.  If  it 
had  been  virtuous  not  to  eat  apples,  and  I  had  been 
Eve,  man  would  never  have  fallen.  I  cannot  abide 
the  sight  of  apples;  although  I  do  not  complain  of 
those  that  eat  them.  No  doubt  they  have  good 
reasons."  Or,  as  the  Signore  says,  somewhat  later: 
"For  the  most  part,  people  know  about  as  much 
about  life  as  they  do  about  the  theatre — they  see 
the  play,  that  is  all;  the  real  show  goes  on  behind 
the  scenes."  (Here,  it  seems  to  me,  Benavente  has 
uttered  an  unconscious  critique  of  his  own  drama; 
one  does  get  the  impression,  often,  that  his  per- 
sonages are  keeping  something  from  the  spectator.) 
Again,  it  is  an  entire  section  of  the  play  that  stands 
out  as  a  miniature  piece  within  a  piece,  as  in  the 
original  third  scene  of  this  scenic  novel: 

We  are  like  witches,  says  Imperia,  meeting  on 
Saturday  night.  I  was  a  little  girl  when  I  first  heard 
the  legend,  and  you  remind  me  of  it  now.  There  was  a 
poor  woman  who  lived  near  our  house.  She  was  very  old, 
and  apparently  very  respectable.  She  lived  alone,  and 
you  would  have  said  that  she  was  a  good  woman.  Her 
house  was  clean;  she  worked  in  the  garden  by  day,  busy 
with  her  flowers,  or  fed  the  pigeons;  at  night  she  sewed  a 
little  on  her  quaint  old  clothes.  She  was  never  idle — 
it  was  a  calm  and  peaceful  life,  lived  openly  in  the  sun. 
But  people  said  that  she  was  a  witch,  and  every  Saturday 
at  midnight,  as  the  clock  struck  twelve,  she  mounted  a 
broomstick  and  flew  away  to  the  witches'  lair,  and  there 
with  the  other  witches  she  did  homage  to  Satan;  and  if 
you  could  surprise  them  then,  you  would  see  them  as 
they  really  were.  One  day,  some  time  later,  at  dawn  on  a 
Sunday  morning,  the  old  woman  was  found  dead,  out  of 


114         rHE  DRAMA  OF    1  RANSITION 

her  bcil,  at  sonic  distance  from  her  house,  in  an  ojHrn 
rteKl,  and  there  was  a  ilagger  in  her  heart.  But  nohtxly 
coukl  ever  find  the  assassin  nor  discover  any  motive  f(jr 
the  murder,  nor  could  anyone  ever  exp^lain  the  reason 
that  woman  should  have  been  found  in  that  place  on 
that  morning,  when  she  had  been  seen  closing  the  door 
of  her  house  as  usual  the  night  before,  and  in  the  morning 
when  they  carried  the  body  there,  the  door  was  still 
closed. 

RiNALDi:  But  you  don't  really  mean?  .  .  .  Non- 
sense!   Then  you  would  have  to  believe  in  witches. 

I M  PERI  a:  No,  not  in  such  witches.  But  there  comes 
a  Saturday  Night  in  all  our  lives,  even  the  most  jxraceful 
of  them,  when  our  souls,  like  the  witches,  fly  to  their  lairs. 
\Vc  exist  f(jr  ilays  to  reach  one  hour  which  is  vital  and  real. 
Then  our  witches'  souls  take  flight,  some  toward  their 
hopes  and  ambitions,  some  towanl  their  vices,  their  tollies, 
others  towanl  their  loves — toward  something  which  is  far 
from  ami  alien  to  our  lives,  but  which  has  always  smoul- 
derei.1  in  us,  antl  at  heart  is  what  we  arc. 

Such  is  the  quasi-I'Veudian  witches'  sabbath  of 
the  play,  which,  if  any  palpable  deduction  may  be 
made  from  its  rapidly  reeling  visions,  suggests  a 
defense  of  the  soul's  repressions.  "To  achieve  any- 
thing in  life  we  must  destroy  reality,"  concludes 
Imperia,  "and  thnist  aside  the  phantoms  of  fact, 
which  confuse  and  hem  us  round,  to  follow  the  only 
reality,  the  flight  of  our  witches'  spirits  on  Saturday 
Night,  as  they  turn  to  their  ideal — some  toward  evil, 
to  be  lost  in  the  shadows  forever  lik^  spectres  of  the 
night,  others  toward  good,  to  dwell  eternally  in  it, 
the  children  of  love  and  light."'     It  is  the   Ibsen 

'  The  excerpts  are  from  Mr.  UndcrhiU's  tnuulation  of  the  play  as  it  appeared 
in  Poet  Lore,  spring  number,  1918.  The  same  issue  contains  a  suggestive  article 
by  Mr.  Underbill  on  "Benavente  Aa  a  Modem." 


,  SPAIN  115 

call  to  selfhood  that  echoes  in  the  words  of  this 
puppet- worn  an.  Perhaps  the  characters  talk  now 
and  then  as  if  they  were  preaching  at  the  audience? 
It  is  not  enough  to  reply  that  Shaw's  personages  are 
merely  the  playwright's  mouthpieces,  something  in 
tjie  manner  of  yesterday's  trick  motion  picture  in 
which  every  performer  in  the  play  had  the  same 
face.  Modern  conversation  is  a  reflection  of  modern 
problems.  Intelligent  folk  are  forever  discussing 
life.  There  is  more  drama  in  a  searching  analysis 
of  vital  contemporary  issues  than  in  all  the  action 
that  ever  packed  a  melodrama  circus. 

Storm  Jameson,  who  beholds  in  Benavente  the 
hope  of  the  Spanish  drama,  is  wiser  than  those 
Spaniards  who  have  called  the  versatile  Jacinto 
foreign  in  artistic  spirit.  Behind  his  affinities  with 
the  modern  Frenchmen  and  contemporary  culture, 
she  beholds  the  spirit  of  Lope  de  Vega,  with  that 
classic  spirit's  tradition  of  suppleness,  his  skill  in 
construction,  his  "splendour  of  movement  and 
music;  Hving,  distinctive  characters.  Only  a  new 
creative  activity  could  give  fresh  life  to  his  pageant 
of  emotion  and  colour,  filling  it  with  the  more  com- 
plex life  of  modernity,  taking  the  highest  from  past 
and  present,  and  making  it  afresh  for  the  new  age. 
.  .  ,  His  (i.  e.,  Benavente's)  comedies  have  ex- 
quisite fantasy,  poetic  grace,  technical  perfection, 
and  intellectual  distinction.  Where  they  fail  is  in 
an  occasional  careless  handling  of  their  finest  qual- 
ities. .  .  .  Fantasy  overshadows  reality,  to  the 
'marring  of  dramatic  proportion." 

It  is  in  The  Bonds  of  Interest  that  she  finds  the 
quintessence  of  these  qualities, — a  piece  none  the 
less   original,   provocative,   illuminating,   salient   in 


r 

I 


116       THK  DRAMA  OF  TR^ANSITION 

modern  drama,  for  its  failure  when  offered  to  New 
York  by  the  Theatre  Guild  in  1919.  Small  need  to 
go  out  of  Spain  for  its  forerunners, — realistic,  in- 
dividualistic Spain  with  its  roster  of  ribald  rogues 
that  begins  with  the  sixteenth-century  iMZiirillo  de 
'Formes  and  comes  right  down  into  our  own  day. 
Nor,  as  we  glance  toward  the  past  for  the  inevitable 
rivals  who  saiel  our  g(K)il  things  before  us,  should  we 
forget,  in  considering  the  contemp>orary  breaking  away 
from  stage  forms,  that  already  at  the  close  of  the 
fifteenth  century  Spain  had  its  Tragicomedia  di 
Caiisto  V  Meiibea  (the  famous  Celestina).  This  play, 
a  novel  in  dialogue,  has  in  its  various  editions  six- 
teen, twenty-one,  and  twenty-two  acts.  Realism, 
pessimism,  passion,  imagination, — all  these  are  in 
the  medieval  work  of  the  Jewish  laywer,  Fernando 
de  Rojas.  It  is  good  that  we  should  recall  betimes 
our  eternal  con  tern  pxiraries. 

The  play  by  which  Henavente  is  best  known  out 
of  his  native  land  is  a  symlK)lic,  marionette  drama 
in  which  are  restored  to  a  new  and  glorious  life  the 
puppets  of  the  Commedia  dell*  Arte.  .And  the  play, 
not  the  plot,  is  the  thing.  Crispin,  the  shameless 
cynic,  archetype  of  wordly  rascality,  paving  the 
way  for  Leandro's  marriage,  so  that  the  debts  they 
have  both  incurred  may  be  paid,  is  a  veritable 
human  summary  of  the  will  to  achieve.  He  is  the 
minor  Mephisto  to  Leandro's  minor  Faust.  He  is, 
rather  than  a  separate  individual,  another  of  Le- 
andro's selves, — the  grosser  metal  that  holds  to- 
gether the  golden  nobility  of  his  master's  soul,  or, 
to  invert  our  philosophy,  the  adventurous  spirit 
that  transcends  Leandro's  bourgeois  ethics.  It  is 
Leandro  who,  redeemed  by  true  love,  is  ready  to 


SPAIN  117 

confess  his  life-lie;  it  is  Crispin  who  prevails  upon 
him  with  more  worldly  counsel,  and  who,  by  his 
uncanny  cleverness,  so  embroils  the  other  puppets 
in  a  network  of  inter-related  interests  that  they 
cannot  expose  his  own  misdoings  without  doing  hurt 
to  themselves.  Such  plays  illuminate  life  by  epito- 
mizing it. 

Yet  note  how  Benavente  is  himself  the  cynic 
even  in  the  prologue  that  he  puts  into  the  mouth 
of  Crispin;  how,  after  presenting  the  play  as  a  child 
of  the  antique  farce,  lifted  by  Lope  de  Rueda, 
Shakespeare,  and  Moliere  to  high  estate,  he  offers 
it  as  "a  little  play  of  puppets,  impossible  in  theme, 
without  any  reality  at  all.  You  will  soon  see  how 
everything  happens  in  it  that  could  never  happen, 
how  its  personages  are  not  real  men  and  women, 
nor  the  shadows  of  them,  but  dolls  or  marionettes 
of  paste  and  cardboard,  moving  upon  wires  which 
are  visible  even  in  a  little  light  and  to  the  dimmest 
eye.  They  are  the  grotesque  masks  of  the  Italian 
Commedia  dell'  Arte,  not  as  boisterous  as  they  once 
were,  because  they  have  aged  with  the  years  and 
have  been  able  to  think  much  in  so  long  a  time. 
The  author  is  aware  that  so  primitive  a  spectacle  is 
unworthy  of  the  culture  of  these  days;  he  throws 
himself  upon  your  courtesy  and  upon  your  goodness 
of  heart.  He  only  asks  that  you  should  make  your- 
selves as  young  as  possible.  The  world  has  grown 
old,  but  art  never  can  reconcile  itself  to  growing 
old,  and  so,  to  seem  young  again,  it  descends  to 
these  fripperies.  And  that  is  the  reason  that  these 
outworn  puppets  have  presumed  to  come  to  amuse 
you  to-night  with  their  child's  play." 

Here  we  have  a  sort  of  anti-technique;  an  art  that 


118       THE  DRAMA  OF  TRANSITION 

seeks  not  so  much  to  conceal  itself  as  to  invite 
attention  to  its  operation.  It  is  one  of  the  many 
signs  of  the  reaction  against  realism  that  stirs  ujxjn 
the  stage  of  every  nation  and  invades  not  only  the 
precincts  of  scenery  and  playcraft,  hut  even  of 
acting.'  The  prologue  is  spoken  in  the  nKK)d  of 
the  man  who  declaims  it;  the  epilogue,  from  Silvia, 
is  a  mirror  of  her  own  gentle  soul: 

You  have  seen  how  these  puppets  have  been  moved 
by  plain  and  obvious  strings,  like  men  and  women  in  the 
farces  of  our  lives — strings  which  were  their  interests, 
their  passions,  and  all  the  illusions  anil  petty  miseries  of 
their  state.  Some  are  pulled  by  the  feet  to  lives  of  rest- 
less and  weary  wandering;  some  by  the  hands  to  toil 
with  pain,  to  struggle  with  bitterness,  to  strike  with 
cunning,  to  slay  with  violence  and  rage.  Hut  into  the 
hearts  ot  all  there  descenils  sometimes  troin  heaven  an  in- 
visible thread,  as  if  it  were  woven  out  of  the  sunlight  and 
the  moonbeams,  the  invisible  thread  of  love,  which  makes 
these  men  and  women,  as  it  iloes  these  puppets  which 
seem  like  men,  almost  divine,  ami  brings  to  our  fore- 
heads the  smile  and  splendors  of  the  dawn,  lends  wings 
to  our  drooping  spirits,  and  whispers  to  us  still  that  this 
farce  is  not  all  a  farce,  that  there  is  s*)mething  noble, 
something  divine  in  our  lives  which  is  tnie  and  which  is 
eternal,  and  which  shall  not  close  when  the  farce  of  life 
shall  close. 

And  just  as  Crispin  and  Leandro  are  but  varying 
aspects  of  the  same  individual,  so  are  the  Crispin 
of  the  prologue  and  the  Silvia  of  the  epilogue  but 
varying  aspects  of  the  author  himself. 

It  is  this  dualism  in  Benavente  that  explains,  if 
it   does   not   wholly  justify,   Ayala's   accusation   of 

>  See  Macgowan  s  The  Thtatre  of  To-morrow,  pages  1M-1S9. 


SPAIN  119 

preachiness.  One  might,  as  a  critical  tour  deforce^ 
go  through  the  Spaniard's  dramas  and  play  the 
game  of  citing  Scripture  against  the  Scriptures. 
Benavente  could  thus,  on  isolated  evidence,  be  made 
out  an  anti-upper-class  satirist  {Gente  Conocida),  a 
sentimental  bourgeois  {Rosas  de  Otono),  a  psycho- 
logical investigator  {La  Malquerida)^  and  what  not 
else.  So  that,  if  Jameson  attributes  too  much  to 
Benavente's  feelings  when  she  says  of  him  that  he 
"cannot  always  hold  his  naked  hate  and  anger  from 
tearing  in  pieces  the  dramatic  fitness  of  speech  and 
character,"  she  hits  the  nail  on  the  head  in  the 
crisp  statement  that  follows  fast  upon  the  other: 
"The  short  measure  of  the  dramatist  is  filled  up  by 
the  preacher.  So  that  not  all  the  radiant  beauty  of 
style,  nor  the  clear,  deep  passion,  nor  the  tender- 
ness, can  carry  his  tragedies  to  the  peaks  that  first 
catch  the  sun.  Yet  he  does  fly,  and  the  wings  are 
the  wings  of  a  god."  Nor  are  those  who  know  her 
theory  of  the  modern  drama  surprised  to  find  her 
interpreting  Crispin  as  the  man  who  "will  live 
dangerously  or  not  at  all.  This  is  more  than  ex- 
quisite dialogue,  more  than  fantasy  in  perfect  form: 
it  is  an  artistic  criticism  of  life,  the  highest  form  of 
comedy;  a  criticism  of  the  world  in  which  the  noble 
must  needs  save  himself  by  the  baser,  where  love 
and  morality  are  pawns  in  the  game  of  the  masters 
of  life.  And  through  it  all,  beneath  the  grace  in 
which  it  clothes  itself,  is  the  pulse  of  creative  life." 
And,  were  she  seeking  support  for  such  an  interpre- 
tation, she  would  find  plenty  in  Benavente's  Princess 
Bebi^  wherein  Princess  Helena  bluntly  asks,  "How 
would  any  human  life  be  possible  if  we  were  not 
able  to  outwit  the  social  laws?"    Yet  it  is  this  same 


120       THE  DR.AMA  OF  TRANSITION 

Helena  who  can  inquire;  "Why  this  insane  desire 
to  shut  ourselves  off  from  each  other,  to  ticket  and 
classify  ourselves,  to  create  distinctions  between  us, 
and  fancy  that  we  are  superior  to  our  fellows,  when 
we  are  all  equal  and  all  belong  to  the  same  race, 
the  poor,  despised,  human  race,  which  spends  all 
its  time  dividing  itself  and  hating  itscH  and  marking 
itself  off  into  classes  and  castes  and  individuals, 
when  all  the  svmpathy  and  all  the  love  in  our  hearts 
which  might  bind  us  together  would  be  too  little 
even  then  among  so  many  to  alleviate  the  sorrows 
of  life?"  It  is  quite  as  difficult  to  pin  his  creatures 
down  as  to  glue  the  label  to  his  elusive  self. 

Bcnaventc's  signihcance  to  the  drama  of  to-day — 
and  it  would  receive  a  prompter  recognition  did  he 
write  in  l-rench  in  a  capital  so  proclamative  as 
Paris  of  its  minor  and  major  glories— lies  in  a  ver- 
satility that  is  more  than  mere  dramaturgic  virtu- 
osity. His  restlessness,  his  cynicism,  his  emotional 
dualism,  are  part  and  parcel  not  only  of  our  peculiar 
modernity,  but  of  every  richer  nature  that  has 
brooded  upon  the  traj^i-comedy  of  life.  Hence  his 
shifting  of  attitudes,  his  disregard  of  conventional 
form,  his  creative  instability.  Hence,  too,  the 
fusion,  not  always  complete,  between  reality  and 
fantasy.  Echegaray  was  merely  prolific;  Benavente's 
fecundity  is  qualitative  as  well  as  quantitative. 
Echegaray  stamped  ready-made  ideas  into  the  pre- 
vailing dramatic  forms;  Benavente's  intellectual 
resiliency  created  its  own  amorphous  ambient.  Yet 
something  in  the  man's  intellect  seems  to  suppress 
the  emotional  fervor  that  alone  could  nourish  living 
creatures    rather    than    sublimated    symbols.      His 


SPAIN  121 

plays,  with  their  thin  fables  and  their  rich  dialogues, 
suggest  those  pages  of  the  Talmud  in  which  islets 
of  text  are  submerged  in  an  ocean  of  commentary. 
Not  so  much  excess  of  emotion,  as  Jameson  would 
have  it,  but  excess  of  intellectuality,  interferes  with 
the  dramatic  fitness  of  speech  and  character.  Can 
this  be  a  prevision  of  our  future  society,  wherein,  as 
in  Shaw's  latest  legend  of  longevity,  the  flesh  and  its 
passions  shall  have  evaporated  into  atmospheric 
thought?  And  shall  the  fruit  of  the  Shavian  re- 
bellion be  nothing  but  this  fleshless  abstraction  from 
the  carnal  roots  of  life?  No,  youth  will  have  none 
of  it,  not  even  a  youth  that  is  born  wise  out  of 
Shavian  eggs  hatched  in  Methuselania.^ 

'  I  must  postpone  to  some  other  occasion  a  consideration  of  the  two  Quintero 
brothers,  Serafin  and  Joaquin,  who  are  so  intimately  connected  with  the  history 
of  the  genero  chico  in  Spain.  Inasmuch  as  they  would  prove  of  particular  interest 
to  those  interested  in  the  one-act  play  and  the  little  theatre,  I  may  mention  that 
the  best  treatment  of  them  in  English  may  be  found  in  the  Introduction  to  the 
text  edition  of  Dona  Clarines  ajid  Mafiana  de  Sol,  by  S.  Griswold  Morley.  The 
Quinteros'  Malvaloca  is  published  in  New  York;  their  A  Sunny  Morning  is  most 
easily  available  in  Fifty  Contemporary  One-Act  Plays,  edited  by  Frank  Shay  and 
Pierre  Loving  (Cincinnati);  The  Fountain  of  Youth  (La  Flor  de  la  Vida)  is  also 
issued  at  Cincinnati. 


ITALY 


ITALY 

Italian  critics  of  the  drama,  who  are  not  any  more 
cheerful  than  the  rest  of  the  tribe,  have  as  much 
reason  as  any  to  bewail  the  low  state  into  which 
the  drama  has  fallen.  There  have  not  been  lacking 
scholars  who  even  deny  that  a  genuinely  national 
stage  exists;  since  Tullio  Fornioni,  in  1885,  started 
the  ball  a-rolling  it  has  been  given  powerful  shoves 
by  such  men  as  Mario  Pilo,  Salvatore  Barzilai  and 
V.  Morello.  Only  yesterday  Signor  Guido  Ruberti, 
in  his  closely  packed  two-volume  book  upon  // 
teatro  contemporaneo  in  Europa^  renews  the  discus- 
sion, and  in  his  section  upon  the  realistic  Italian 
drama  (I,  211)  declares  bluntly,  "The  truth  is  that 
Italy  has  never  had  a  truly  national  theatre."  In 
the  ensuing  commentary  he  indicates  that  there  is, 
in  the  very  nature  of  the  Italian  people,  a  certain 
quality  that  is  anti-dramatic  in  effect;  the  spiritual 
and  material  difficulties  experienced  by  the  nation 
while  other  countries  were  conquering  a  greater  or 
less  degree  of  liberty  caused  it  to  turn  in  upon  itself, 
accustoming  it,  perforce,  to  a  "singular  mental 
habit  of  adaptation  and  conciliation;  a  remarkable 
equilibrium  that  succeeds  in  fusing  within  itself  the 
most  diverse  tendencies,  harmonizing  them  in  a 
supreme  ideal  that  is  neither  skepticism  nor  austere 
faith,  neither  absolute  indifferentism  nor  unreflect- 
ing passion,  yet  feeds  upon  and  communicates  all 
these."  The  Italian  conscience,  moreover,  unlike 
the  Slavic,  finds  its  great  problems  settled  in  ad- 

125 


126        THK  DRAMA  (W  TRANSITION 

vance  by  its  creed,  thus  removing,  or  at  least  greatly 
modifying,  one  of  the  mainspirings  of  dramatic  ac- 
tion. In  the  jxjwerfui  scenes  of  passionate  crime 
the  critic  sees  but  added  pr(x)f  of  the  primitiveness 
of  his  people;  upon  them,  he  tells  us,  the  currents 
of  modern  thought  make  little  impression. 

For  much  of  the  delay  in  the  achieving  of  a 
national  theatre  the  influence  of  I*>ancc  is  blamed, 
— the  same  France'  in  whom  Spanish-American 
critics  fear  a  denationalizing  allurement,  in  whom 
Portuguese  students  behold  a  decentralizing  siren, 
in  whom  Brazilian  youth  of  autonomous  aspirations 
point  out  a  Gallicizing  evil.  .Again,  the  presence  of 
so  many  well-defined  regif)ns,  each  with  its  own 
psychology,  its  own  pride,  its  own  determination  to 
preserve  its  spiritual  intlenendence,  acts  as  a  hin- 
drance to  the  formation  of  a  distinctly  recoijnizable 
national  drama.  The  Italian  dialect  stage  is  an  im- 
portant institution;  Rome,  Sicily,  Milan,  Bologna, 
Venice,  Naples, — these  are,  from  the  stantl{-H)int  of 
the  drama,  lairly  nations  within  a  nation,  and  even 
the  better-known  Italian  playwrights  are  proud  to 
write  for  them.  \'erga  and  Pirandello  are  intimatelv 
associated  with  their  native  Sicily,  Bracco  with  his 
beloved  Naples,  Sabatino  Lopez  with  his  Tuscan 
birthplace. 

If,  then,  it  is  yet  a  problem  whether  Italy's  drama 
be  tnily  national  as  an  institution,  there  can  be  no 
question  as  to  the  activity  of  its  stage.  The  war, 
as  everywhere  else,  precipitated  an  intellectual  tur- 
moil; forces  that  had  been  slowly  gathering  burst 
forth  as  if  caused  rather  than  merely  hastened  by 
the  conflict;  there  were  sudden  conversions,  as  wit- 

•  "Qurata  Italia  teatrale  che  ha  per  capo  Parigi,"  says  Benelli  in  the  foreword 
to  his  newest  play.  .4/i. 


ITALY  127 

ness  the  philosophical  volte-face  of  Giovanni  Papini 
in  his  often  beautiful  yet  often  tediously  maunder- 
ing Storia  di  Crista  and  the  just  as  maundering  but 
far  less  beautiful  play  by  Sem  Benelli,  called  AH. 
In  such  novels  as  Mario  Puccini's  Viva  Vanarchial 
and  Borgese's  Rubh^  one  could  see  the  wavering  of 
the  Italian  intellectual.  The  light  cast  by  such  books 
as  these  illuminated  the  turbid  maelstrom  of  swirl- 
ing ideas;  to  be  sure,  the  light  fell  upon  confusion, 
yet  out  of  that  confusion  something  like  compre- 
hensible units  of  activity  emerge,  not  without  sig- 
nificance for  the  immediate  future  of  the  country. 
Marinetti's  Futurism,  only  part  of  a  larger  lunacy, 
may  not  be  dismissed  in  toto  any  more  than  may  the 
German  Expressionists  or  the  once  rampant  Dada- 
ists,  whose  wild  exploits,  often  meaningless,  are  yet 
not  without  meaning.  The  so-called  "grotesque" 
theatre,  similarly  symptomatic  of  a  social  state,  is 
clearer  in  performance  and  claims  at  least  one  sig- 
nificant figure  in  Pirandello.  Such  poetic  attempts 
as  Morselli's  Glauco  and  Forzano's  Sly  show  that 
even  in  the  midst  of  disorder  may  come  plays  of 
sweetness  in  which  something  of  classic  permanence 
inheres.  If  these  days,  then,  show  for  Italy  little 
in  the  nature  of  definite,  indisputable  accomplish- 
ment, the  era  is  one  of  experiment  in  many  direc- 
tions. 

There  is  Francesco  Scardaoni's  proposal  for  a  new 
theatre  that  shall  become  nothing  less  than  a  temple; 
it  must  not  be  defiled  by  problems  nor  be  clouded  by 
too  much  poetic  incense;  it  must  house  pure  beauty. 
In  the  ecstatic  words  that  conclude  his  essay  upon 
a  new  "Theory  of  the  Tragedy,"  which  forms  one 
of  the  two  prefaces — not  to  speak  of  an  autobio- 


128       THE  DRAMA  OF  TRANSITION 

graphic    postlude — to   his    recent   phiy    Ne/  Grande 
Silenzio  he  proclaims: 

"The  stage  is  an  altar  upon  which  Beauty  consecrates 
its  rites,  and  Beauty  is  the  religion  of  life. 

"All  the  rites  of  all  religions  were  originally  tragic 
pantomime;  metaphysical  deviations  and  false  divinities 
prevented  development  and  dispersed  values. 

"Without  tragic  celebration  no  rites  exist,  ami  without 
rites  there  is  no  religion. 

"Whence  it  appears  that  the  religion  of  Beauty  is 
supreme. 

"The  temples  became  theatres;  it  is  now  time  for  the 
theatres  to  become  temples."' 

This  doctrine  the  writer  develops  in  a  rather 
long  essay,  in  which  he  advances  the  "unity  of 
beauty"  as  the  sole  worthy  unity.  Truth  to  tell, 
he  has  but  changed  names.  His  new  unity  is  hardly 
novel.  He  does  perform  a  valuable  service,  how- 
ever, in  pointing  out  that  the  interpretation  of  life 
uf)on  the  stage  may  be  infinite,  and  should  not  be 
restricted  to  a  single  point  of  view,  and  that  because 
of  this  variety  of  existence,  the  opportunity  for 
beauty  by  combining  experiences  into  new  harmonies 
is  rich.  .And  since  we  must  have  "isms",  he  presents 
us  with  a  new  one:  "Dramatic  Polyphonism."  Here, 
however,  he  has  touched  upon  a  genuinely  important 
consideration.  He  would,  for  example,  deny  su- 
premacy even  to  dialogue  ufK)n  the  stage.^  Con- 
ventional text-books  upon  the  drama  usually  assert 
that  dialogue  is  the  distinguishing  attribute  of  the 

•  It  is  interesting  to  note  that  the  Russian  SoloRub  has,  in  his  Theatre  of  the 
Single  IVill,  developed  a  similar  theory  of  the  theatre  as  becoming  once  again  a 
temple.  ".  .  .  The  hour  will  come,"  he  says,  "when,  in  the  transcendence  of 
body  and  spirit,  we  shjill  come  together  in  liturgical  ceremony,  in  sacramental 
rites." 

'Compare  Evreinov's  subordination  of  the  spoken  word  in  hia  "monodrama. " 


ITALY  129 

drama — that  no  sooner  do  two  people  get  to  con- 
versing than  the  elements  of  drama  are  already 
present.  Not  so  for  Signor  Scardaoni.  Just  as  we 
have  become  accustomed  to  doing  away  with  lay 
figures  like  the  regular  hero,  heroine,  villain,  comic 
man,  and  so  on,  and  witness  with  pleasure  plays  in 
which  the  personages  fuse  into  the  natural  group  of 
human  beings  that  they  form  off  stage,  so  does 
Scardaoni  look  forward  to  a  drama  in  which  even 
dialogue  has  been  robbed  of  its  supremacy  and  been 
made  to  fuse  with  the  other  elements  of  the  play — 
the  pauses  of  silence,  for  instance,  the  words,  ges- 
tures, lights,  colors,  which  combine  to  establish  a 
"cosmic  zone." 

Scardaoni's  essays  repay  the  reading.  Like  all 
enthusiasts,  he  has  simply  forgotten  to  extend  his 
theories  to  the  tolerant  point  of  allowing  other  views 
of  the  stage.  Even  as  he  refuses  to  allow  dialogue 
to  dominate  the  theatre,  forcing  it  to  fuse  with 
other  elements  into  a  perfect  whole,  so  he  should  be 
willing  to  recognize  that  not  even  his  cult  of  beauty 
should  occupy  the  stage-temple  to  the  exclusion  of 
all  other  forms.  Just  because  life  is  so  manifold  in 
its  phases  we  are  ready,  nay  eager,  for  new  aspects 
of  the  drama.  But  just  as  surely  is  it  impossible 
for  any  one  aspect  to  sweep  aside  all  the  others 
with  an  essay. 

There  is  Achille  Ricciardi,  with  his  interesting 
Theatre  of  Color.  His  book,  //  Teatro  del  Colore^  is 
dedicated  to  Gabriel  d'Annunzio,  who  first  invited 
him  to  write  it,  and  he  promises  to  follow  it  with 
another  that  shall  occupy  itself  with  an  "artistic 
offensive."  Despite  the  fact  that  the  book  saw  the 
light  only  in  recent  years,  the  theories  contained  in 


130       THE  DR.AMA  OF  TRANSITION 

it  were  developed  as  far  back  as  1906,  and  it  is  not 
without  ill-repressed  dissatisfaction  that  the  author 
saw  his  ideas  appropriated  by  Sem  Bcnclli  and  men- 
tioned in  the  Italian  press  as  emanating  from  that 
source. 

Ricciardi  is  not  so  dogmatic  in  his  assertions  as 
Scardaoni.  He  does  not  insist  that  the  theatre  of 
color  is  the  only  possible  theatre,  and  that  in  it  lies 
the  sole  hope  of  the  drama's  future.  He  recognizes 
that  there  are  types  of  play  to  which  his  ideas  do 
not  apply.  On  the  other  hand,  he  is  well  satisfied, 
and  quite  readily  convinces  the  reader,  that  the  pos- 
sibilities of  color  as  employed  in  dramatic  repre- 
sentations have  been  only  scratched  upon  the  sur- 
face. We  have  too  long  been  content  to  use  color 
merely  as  a  decorative  element,  overlooking  the 
fact  that,  so  to  speak,  it  has  a  life  of  its  own,  a  rich 
treasury  of  emotive  connotations,  and  may  be  em- 
ployed as  a  distinctly  psychological  factor,  with 
gradations,  combinations  and  climaxes  all  its  own. 
In  a  fairly  long  preliminary  discussion  he  enters 
into  an  abridged  history  of  color-values,  carefully 
distinguishing  previous  attempts  from  his  own.  He 
insists  that  his  innovation  possesses  primary  aesthetic 
significance.  "Even  the  color  of  the  clothes  de- 
termines the  psychology  of  the  dramatic  person. 
.  .  .  In  the  development  of  the  drama  the  color 
of  the  costumes  follows  the  ascent  of  the  emotions. 
Every  ev^ent  takes  place  in  a  special  atmosphere, 
with  its  individual  color.     .     .     ." 

Ricciardi  believes  that  the  proper  sphere  for  the 
application  of  this  theory  is  in  plays  of  a  fantastic 
character.  There  is  no  doubt  that  it  may  be  ap- 
plied, in  modified  form,  to  any  play  of  worth.    Only 


ITALY  131 

one  serious  objection  (and  not  at  all  an  insurmount- 
able one,  as  far  as  practical  production  is  concerned) 
may  be  suggested.  Do  colors  affect  all  persons  the 
same  way?  And  granted  this,  do  colors  affect  all 
persons  in  the  same  way  at  the  same  time?  If  not, 
how  can  full  use  of  the  colors  as  a  psychological 
factor  be  made?  It  should  be  remembered  that 
Ricciardi  is  not  concerned  primarily  with  color  as 
decoration  or  as  symbol,  but  as  a  vital  factor  such 
as  sound  is  in  music.  The  innovator  seems  to  feel 
the  validity  of  this  objection,  for  toward  the  close 
of  his  exposition  he  asserts  that  certain  values  of 
color — he  calls  them  moral — are  widespread,  such 
as  red  and  blue  for  happy  moods,  and  white  for 
purity.  Moreover,  colors  in  motion,  production  of 
contrasts,  and  so  on,  possess  psychological  effects  of 
their  own,  and  doubtless  the  words  of  the  piece 
could  suggest  subtly  the  influences  intended.  Color, 
then,  is  here  not  the  equivalent  of  other  sensations, 
"but  it  modifies  their  tone  and  thus  creates  some- 
thing sui  generis." 

Ricciardi  seems  to  establish  very  firmly  his  posi- 
tion as  the  genuine  innovator  in  this  regard.  It  is 
of  interest  to  note  how  constant  is  the  deference  of 
both  Scardaoni  and  Ricciardi  (as  well  as  more  than 
one  other  of  the  innovators  in  the  United  States, 
Germany,  and  elsewhere)  to  Greek  models  and  an- 
cient procedure.  Behind  all  the  agitation  lies  clearly 
a  yearning  for  spiritual  freedom.  To  Ricciardi  as 
to  Scardaoni,  there  is  something  of  the  rite  in  the 
drama;  the  former  would  even  seek  his  ideal  stage 
upon  the  Mediterranean,  thus  returning  to  the 
open  air  of  the  ancients. 

In  Benelli's  most  recent  play  we  shall  witness  the 


132       THE  DRAMA  OF  TRANSITION 

effect  of  the  war  upon  one  of  the  chief  ante-bellum 
playwrights  of  Italy.  This  done,  for  a  few  pages 
we  shall  revert  to  the  recently  deceased  dean  of 
Italian  letters,  Giovanni  \'erga,  whose  modest  plays 
yet  constitute  for  some  the  hope  of  a  national 
renaissance  in  the  drama.  \Vc  shall  then  be  ready 
to  appreciate  the  actual  direction — or  rather  direc- 
tions— taken  by  that  drama  since  Verga's  Cavallrria 
Rusticana^  now  in  the  poetic  play  (whether  in  prose 
or  verse)  of  a  Morselli  or  a  Forzano,  now  in  the 
futuristic  orgasms  of  Marinctti,  and  particularly  in 
the  "grotesque"  school  which  received  its  name  from 
a  queer  production  by  Chiarclli,  and  counts  among 
its  followers  a  motley  band  over  which  the  gifted 
Pirandello  easily  assumes  supremacy. 

BENELLI'S  NEW  APOSTOLATE 

All  {IV'tngs)  was  first  produced  at  the  Teatrn 
IManzoni,  in  Milan,  on  March  14  of  this  year,  with 
Alda  Borelli  in  the  chief  feminine  part  of  Marta  and 
Tullio  Carminati  in  the  mystical  part  of  Luca. 
As  one  of  the  consequences  of  the  critical  discussion 
aroused  by  the  production  we  have  a  long  foreword 
by  the  author,  entitled  "Words  to  be  Read  Before 
the  Drama  and  After,"  nor  is  he  hesitant,  in  the 
course  of  this  polemical  prologue,  about  asking  his 
reader  to  go  over  the  play  more  than  once,  lest  im- 
portant detail  escape  him.  If  the  evidence  of  the 
play  itself  were  not  sufficient,  surely  the  tone  and 
temper  of  these  preliminary  pages  would  show  that 
Benelli  was  in  an  apostolic  mood.  One  may  even 
see  in  his  abandonment  of  verse  an  added  pledge  ot 
his  seriousness.  Yet  more  than  a  little  of  the  old 
Benelli  is  there — the  Benelli  whose  fondness  for  the 


ITALY  133 

past  prisons  him  even  when  he  would  be  most 
modern;  whose  psychology  is  fairly  one-sided,  and 
never  more  so  than  in  his  newest  production;  who 
is  so  centered  upon  the  harsher  aspects  of  the  human 
soul  that  he  must  be  harsh  even  in  his  portrayal  of 
a  Christ-like  figure  such  as  Luca  in  Wings.  It  is 
easy  to  believe  that  the  Italian,  goaded  by  many 
suggestions  that  he  was  falling  into  a  rut  in  his 
"theatre,"  determined  to  refute  the  innuendoes  with 
a  play  that  should  present  a  new  phase  of  his  art. 
What  is  more  likely  is  that  Wings^  his  first  play  in 
six  years,  represents  the  response  of  a  sensitive  soul 
to  the  brutalities  of  a  conflict  in  which  he  shared, 
not  unmindful  of  the  brutality  nor  of  the  necessity. 
For  the  rest,  it  is  useful  to  recall  that  the  remark- 
able conversion  of  the  heritic  Papini  is  but  a  symp- 
tom of  what  is  occurring  in  contemporary  Italy. 
Wings  may  not  be  Benelli's  return  to  "the"  faith, 
but  it  surely  signals  a  powerful  affirmation  of  faith 
and  even  suggests — nothing  less — the  influence  of 
an  Ibsen  who,  thirty-five  years  ago,  wrote  Brand. 
The  play,  for  all  this  eloquent  defense,  is  not  one 
of  Benelli's  best.  In  fact,  with  the  exception  of  a  few 
high  moments  in  the  fourth  and  last  acts,  it  is  rather 
dull  and  static,  and  one  may  gather  as  fruitful  a 
notion  of  what  it  is  all  about  from  the  somewhat 
hectic  foreword  as  from  the  sultry  symbolistic  drama 
that  follows.  That  the  action  is  autobiographical 
Benelli  denies,  although  he  is  ready  enough  to  ad- 
mit that  it  mirrors  his  "unspeakable  torment" 
amidst  the  vertiginous  life  through  which  we  are 
passing.  The  point  of  view  coincides  with  that  of 
his  poem,  L Altare;  he  is  confident  that  life  has  a 
mission,  and  seeks  a  goal  which  he  calls  "the,  har- 


134       THE  DR.AMA  OF  TRANSITION 

mony  of  individual,  free  forces,"  in  which  shall  be 
found  paradise.  Such  a  quest  involves  martyrdom, 
and  If  lugs  is  the  drama  of  that  self-immolation. 
To  the  short-sighted  folk  who  denied  to  If'iugs  any 
essential  dramatic  character  because  its  protagonist 
does  not  emerge  victorious,  he  replies  that  Luca's 
defeat  is  the  very  element  that  renders  .///  a  tragedy. 
"Human  impotence  is  the  greatest  truth  that  the 
tragic  poets  of  all  times  and  all  places  have  ex- 
pressed. The  greatest  tragedy  of  all  lies  in  the 
Unattainable!"  He  composed  this  drama,  then, 
"in  my  own  way,  and  not  accortiing  to  the  conven- 
tions of  the  theatre.  I  have  never  done  otherwise." 
(What!  Never,  signore?)  "The  word  'theatrical'  I 
consider  silly.  Give  me  the  proper  bridge,  and  I'll 
lead  on  to  the  stage  for  you  any  charm,  any  creature, 
any  event." 

From  this  to  righteous  wrath  against  the  com- 
mercial stage  is  but  another  little  bridge,  and  Sem 
Benelli  crosses  it,  crying  somewhat  vainly  and  with 
unconscious  humor,  "The  theatre  is  but  a  market- 
place to-day!"  (With  his  Jest  in  its  seventeenth 
edition  and  sixtieth  thousand  to  date!)  The  truth 
is  that  Benelli  has  discovered  the  difficulties  that 
beset  JVirigs^  and  this  his  foreword  shows  clearly. 
In  his  indignation  against  the  French  importations 
to  the  Italian  theatre  he  is  more  than  a  little  jus- 
tified; but  why  in  all  conscience  should  he,  who  has 
helped  so  greatly  to  enamour  the  Italians  of  their 
past,  ridicule  them  for  their  fondness  for  Harlequin 
and  Puncinello?  And  why,  after  satirizing  those 
who  wished  to  learn  the  meaning  of  his  drama,  does 
he  proceed  forthwith  to  offer  an  elucidation.''     And 


ITALY  135 

why,  too,  his  acrimonious  assault  upon  the  reviewers, 
against  whom  he  seems  to  feel  so  well  fortified? 

Is  it  not  a  trifle  possible  that  Benelli  himself  has 
a  feeling  of  failure?  If  he  has  not  such  a  feeling, 
then  he  has  confused  his  prophetic  fervor  with 
dramatic  values,  and  in  so  doing  has  but  followed  the 
example  of  more  than  one  of  the  reviewers  to  whom 
he  is  so  ineffectively  saucy.  He  has  set  himself 
an  ascetic  ideal,  broader  than  that  embraced  by 
any  one  religion.  Benelli,  born  of  Jews,  himself 
tells  us  that  his  Luca,  "who  might  also  be  a  Cath- 
olic," is  tormented  by  a  vaster  mystery — to  love 
without  sin,  even  at  the  cost  of  not  loving  at  all. 
"Rather  be  sterile  than  sinful."  And  to  the  objec- 
tion that  sin  is  unconquerable  and  perhaps  even 
necessary,  since  everybody  sins,  he  replies,  "It  is 
not  necessary.  Sin  is  the  infamy  of  man,  not  the 
infamy  of  God."  Toward  the  end  of  the  foreword, 
speaking  half  for  his  protagonist  and  half  for  him- 
self, Benelli  concludes: 

I  cannot  help  being  a  martyr,  for  the  good  that  I 
glimpse  is  too  great  and  will  destroy  my  real  good.  .  .  . 
Martyrdom  is  the  flower  of  a  fruit  that  has  no  season. 
Martyrdom  is  the  only  consolation  of  my  littleness.  The 
sole  weapon  that  I  have  with  which  to  demonstrate  my 
truth,  for  I  have  not  offered  only  arguments — I  have 
offered  my  life.  The  greatest  martyrdom  is  that  which 
the  asserter  of  an  idea  imposes  upon  himself  when  he 
proclaims,  "I  no  longer  belong  to  anybody." 

Thus  speaks  not  a  dramatist  but  a  preacher. 
He  may  be  noble,  he  may  win  our  sympathies,  even 
our  devotion,  but  if  he  has  not  written  a  good  drama 
he  is  not  a  good  dramatist.     And  judged  by  the 


136       THE  DRAMA  OF  TRANSITION 

standards  of  drama  rather  than  of  religious  vision, 
Benelli,  in  this  play,  suffers  a  fall  from  grace,  flings 
is  dull;  it  is  repetitious;  it  does  not  begin  to  move 
until  the  play  is  nearly  over;  it  is  preachy,  all-too- 
preachy,  unredeemed  by  humor,  by  human  plia- 
bility, by  psychological  insight,  by  any  sort  of  ac- 
tion. At  times  it  is  wooden;  at  best  it  bursts  into 
occasional  flights  of  fanatic  eloquence,  and  for  a 
moment  here  and  there  a  human  trait  emanates 
from  personages.  Then  woman  may  rail  at  man's 
spiritual  infidelity;  then  man  may  become  a  thrall 
to  visions  that  tear  him  from  earthly  bonds,  only 
to  meet,  between  him  and  his  longings,  the  eternal 
wall  of  flesh.  But  what  are  such  moments  against 
long  stretches  of  ranting,  of  mystical  maundering, 
of  arid  conversation,  or  worse,  debate?  Benelli 
denies  that  he  is  Luca,  yet  after  one  has  read  the 
play — and,  in  due  courtesy  to  the  author's  wishes, 
read  again  the  foreword — one  feels  that  Luca,  not 
Benelli,  must  have  written  that  preamble. 

The  play  opens  just  after  Luca  has  lost  his  wife 
Anna,  in  whose  death  he  finds  it  is  impossible  to 
believe.  To  his  skeptical  physician-friend,  Giovanni, 
he  confides  the  strange  thoughts  that  have  come  to 
overwhelm  him,  and  unbosoms  himself  about  his 
domestic  relations  and  his  own  sad  life.  His  wife's 
people — foreigners — do  not  think  well  of  him  be- 
cause he  is  "an  Italian  first,  and  only  then  an  artist." 
His  mother's  career  has  been  overcast  by  illicit 
love.  And  in  him  burns  the  nostalgia  of  martyrdom. 
"Evil  is  conquered  only  by  good.  .  .  .  Renuncia- 
tion, Giovanni!  I  have  thought  to  die  thus.  I  no 
longer  desire  to  live,  to  be.  This  suspense,  this 
everlasting  farewell,  this  conquest  of  horror,  recol- 


ITALY  137 

lection,  affection,  everything,  fill  me  with  such 
power  that  nothing  remains  but  to  conquer  death." 
Luca  masters  his  grief  and  is  soon  known  as  the 
chief  of  a  small  cult;  he  refuses  to  write  for  a  news- 
paper that  asks  his  beliefs;  he  refuses  to  debate 
with  his  opponents,  although  within  a  few  minutes 
of  his  refusal  he  is  hotly  engaged  in  an  exposition 
of  his  faith;  he  has  entered  into  relations  with 
Marta,  a  woman  whose  flesh  has  led  her  to  the  spirit, 
and  to  whose  body  Luca's  soul  has  descended.  She 
feels  her  ascent  as  plainly  as  she  feels  his  sense  of 
retrogression,  and  it  torments  her  even  as  later 
Luca's  unbending  self-righteousness  is  to  torment 
his  mother.  Yet  there  are  times  when  she  floods 
him  with  a  passion  that  overwhelms  and  convinces 
even  herself.  At  the  end  of  the  second  act,  he 
cries  to  her:  "Ah,  Marta,  Marta!  If  you  were  not 
the  truth,  I  should  be  betrayed  by  the  very  smile 
of  the  universe,  for  I   see  only  you  upon  earth!" 

And  she,  in  response:    "I   believe  you!     I   believe 

I" 
you! 

Yet  neither  here  speaks  sober  belief,  for  to  Luca, 
the  apostle,  this  woman  is  sin  and  hindrance;  and  to 
Marta  a  self-sacrificing,  redeemed  soul,  Luca  is  the 
prey  to  a  fleshless  delusion.  Soon  another  trial 
assails  Luca.  His  delicate  little  son,  who  has  been 
cared  for  at  a  religious  institution,  dies  on  the  same 
day  that  the  father  has  been  attacked  in  his  school- 
room by  a  mob  that  did  not  understand.  The  little 
one's  death  seems  to  be  the  decisive  element  in  com- 
pleting Luca's  separation  from  Marta;  until  now  it 
has  been  a  spiritual  division;  henceforth  it  will  be 
corporeal  as  well.  He  leaves  her,  as  he  believes, 
forever. 


138       THE  DRAMA  OF  TR.\NSITION 

Marta  follows  him,  however,  to  the  house  of  his 
mother,  where  for  a  month  he  has  been  acting 
strangely.  The  two  women  meet,  each  in  sorrow, 
anguished  that  they  have  no  hold  upon  the  man  of 
their  thoughts.  Returning,  as  is  his  wont,  at  sun- 
set from  a  day  of  contemplation  on  the  heights, 
Luca  encounters  them.  In  the  one  he  beholds  the 
woman  who  for  the  while  enslaved  his  senses;  in 
the  other,  the  one  who  early  became  a  slave  to  her 
own,  thus  blighting  his  memory  of  her.  The  sight 
of  both  hardens  his  soul;  he  curses  the  blind  passion 
that  enmeshed  him  and  them  and  the  wtjrld.  But 
neither  are  they  silent — they  to  whose  love  he  has 
been  blind.  "Silence,  mother!"  he  cries.  "I  can 
no  longer  listen  to  you.  You're  no  longer  mother  to 
me.     You're  a  woman!"     And  she,  in  an  outburst: 

Yes,  I  am  a  woman.  .And  what  have  you  given  to  me 
as  your  mother?  You  followed  that  father  of  yours  who 
sent  me  away!  Now  I  can  see  you  as  you  really  are, 
after  almost  thirty  years!  What  have  you  given  me  as 
your  mother?  As  a  woman  I  won  love!  Have  I  anything 
to  boast  of  as  a  mother?  I  became  a  mother  by  accident, 
without  desiring  it;  and  my  son  flees  me!  But  love  did 
not  betray  me!  He  who  made  me  over  is  dead,  but  I 
love  him  still!  As  between  my  love  and  you,  it's  you 
who  are  the  stranger!  And  if  there  is  anyone  here  who 
does  not  know  what  pardon  means,  it  is  you!  And  if 
there  is  one  here  who  does  not  know  what  love  means, 
it  is  you!  .  .  .  Leave  my  house.  The  nearer  we  are 
to  each  other,  the  more  strangers  we.     Let  me  alone! 

For  the  first  time  a  latent  doubt  finds  voice  in 
Luca,  and  he  says  in  characteristic  fashion:  "I 
doubt!  I  doubt!  .  .  .  Martyrdom!  In  his  hour 
of  despair,    he   who   cannot   sufficiently    affirm    his 


ITALY  139 

truth  can  always  through  his  self-sacrifice  disturb 
that  humanity  which  does  not  understand  him. 
And  now  I  desire  martyrdom."  Is  it  any  wonder 
that  his  mother  calls  him  out  of  his  mind  and  re- 
minds him  that  his  dream  has  led  him  to  insult  his 
mother  and  despise  the  woman  who  brought  him 
her  love?  Now  it  is  Marta's  turn  to  appear.  Bru- 
tally Luca  tells  her  that  he  no  longer  loves  her. 

Marta:  Then  tell  me;  tell  me  the  truth.  While  I, 
with  my  vast,  all-embracing  love,  fashioned  of  light  and 
faith,  of  joy  and  veneration,  was  giving  all  of  me  to  you, 
serving  you,  rendering  myself  truly  worthy  of  you  as  I 
imagined  you  to  be,  were  you  then  truly  worthy  of  me, 
as  I  was  thus  transformed? 

LucA:     Don't  ask  me! 

Marta  {with  an  outcry):     Tell  me! 

LucA:  No,  no,  no.  I  was  merely  smitten  with  your 
beauty,  your  flesh,  your  softness,  by  voluptuousness. 
.  .  .  Every  time  that  I  had  you,  the  more  you  bent 
yourself  to  my  desires,  the  more  I  felt  degraded.  I  felt 
forever  upon  the  verge  of  sin,  ignominy,  stultification; 
and  I  fell  thousands  of  times.  ...  I  fled  you!  If  I 
were  to  have  continued  living  with  you  I'd  have  had  either 
to  die  infamously  or  curse  you  without  cease.  That  is  the 
truth. 

In  her  horror  at  this  revelation  Marta  draws  a 
revolver  from  her  bag  and  shoots  him.  At  once  she 
is  seized  with  remorse  and  his  mother  rushes  to  his 
side.  "You  have  done  well,"  he  gasps  to  Marta, 
and  to  his  mother,  'T  .  .  .  I  .  .  .  the  truth. 
.  .  .  .  I  .  .  .  the  light!"  The  gardener,  hear- 
ing the  shot,  runs  upon  the  scene.  Luca,  fearing  lest 
Marta's  crime  become  known,  manages  to  declare 
that  he  has  shot  himself,  and  his  parting  injunction 
to  the  women  is  to  love  each  other.     "Dying,  I 


140       THE  DRAMA  OF  TRANSITION 

learn  for  the  first  time  the  sweetness  of  that  jnirdon 
which  at  last  opens  for  me  the  gates  of  my  earth 
.    .    .    Paradise." 

The  play  contains  hints  of  poetry,  hut  little  of 
the  vital  spark.  In  characterization  it  is  especially 
weak;  Luca  is  hardly  more  than  a  mouthpiece, 
while  Marta  and  Luca's  mother  are  convenient 
foils  and  interlocutors.  Giovanni  and  Professor 
Torre  are  stif^"  variants  of  the  "raisonneur,"  who 
was  once  so  familiar  a  figure  in  the  I'rcnch  drama 
that  Benelli  scorns.  Quaranta  is  the  most  rigid  of 
stage  types,  serving  but  to  draw  out  Luca  by  his 
opposition  and  to  perform  a  lightning-like  conver- 
sion from  which  he  recoils  with  equal  rapiditv. 
One  may  question  the  necessity  of  having  Anna's 
parents  appear  in  the  first  act,  after  which  they  are 
almost  forgotten.  Anna  herself  is  not  seen,  though 
her  presence  fills  the  opening  scene.  In  all  serious- 
ness, I  believe  that  the  one  plausible  character  in 
the  play  is  the  gardener,  Pietro,  who  appears  for  a 
few  minutes  in  the  closing  act,  but  who,  during  those 
fleeting  moments,  behaves  himself  like  a  human 
being.  For  the  few  changes  of  mind  that  Luca  ex- 
periences we  are  hardly  prepared;  between  act  one 
and  act  two  he  has  already  formed  a  cult  and  taken 
a  mistress,  despite  the  ascetic  exaltation  and  long- 
ing for  paradise  in  the  beginning.  All  this  is  pos- 
sible and  natural,  but  must  we  take  it  on  Benelli's 
word  in  the  case  of  a  play  centered  about  Luca's 
Messianic  figure.''  Let  others  judge  the  ideas  and 
idealism  of  the  play.  As  drama  it  is  quite  unin- 
spiring and  without  efl^ect.  To  use  Benelli's  own 
words,  he  has  not  discovered  the  right  "bridge" 
that  leads  to  the  opening  of  such  material. 


ITALY  141 

GIOVANNI  VERGA 

With  the  recent  passing  of  Verga  (1840-1922)  Italy- 
lost  the  dean  of  her  letters — a  powerful  solitary  fig- 
ure whose  stylistic  austerity  and  personal  aloofness 
foredoomed  him  to  the  lonely  eminence  that  was 
his.  He  is  intimately  associated,  in  the  history  of 
his  country's  letters,  with  the  movement  known  in 
the  peninsula  as  "verism,"  and  out  of  it  as  realism 
and  naturalism.  Verism,  of  course,  has  its  distin- 
guishing characteristics,  but  it  is  part  of  the  great 
anti-romantic  reaction  and  in  Verga  found  such 
vigorous,  artistic  expression — and  withal  so  arrest- 
ingly  personal — that  even  to-day  more  than  one  of 
the  "you^g"  writers  is  not  ashamed  to  acknowledge 
the  influence  of  the  deceased  master.  Labels 
mattered  little  to  him.  "Words,  words,  words," 
he  once  declared.  "Naturalism,  psychologism ! 
There's  room  for  everything,  and  the  work  of  art 
may  be  born  of  any  'ism.'  Let  it  be  born — that  is 
the  main  thing!"  He  had  as  little  liking  for  the 
term  "verist"  as  Ibsen  for  the  appellation  Ibsenite, 
and  was  so  aloof  that  when,  in  1920,  his  country- 
men honored  him  on  his  eightieth  birthday,  many 
had  to  be  informed  all  over  again  that  his  /  Mal- 
avoglia  (1881)  was  one  of  the  best  novels  of  its  age, 
and  that  its  author  was  one  of  the  most  solid  glories 
of  latter-day  Italian  literature.  That  he  was  the 
author  of  the  intense  Cavalleria  Rusticana^  out  of 
which  was  made  the  libretto  of  Mascagni's  mel- 
lifluous opera,  was  matter  of  more  common  knowl- 
edge. 

He  was  born  in  Catania,  and  began  his  career  as 
a    writer    of   conventional    novels    redolent    of    the 


142       THE  DR.AMA  OF  TRANSITION 

French  feuilletons;  his  very  first  (unprinted)  work 
was  an  extensive  novel  inspired  by  George  Wash- 
ington and  American  Independence.  Yet  in  a 
deeper  sense  the  work  of  Verga  is  a  psychological 
unitv,  and  close  study  of  the  early  hooks  shows  the 
young  Verga  to  be  father  to  the  older.  The  novel 
that  caps  his  creations,  /  Malavoglia^  was  intended 
to  be  the  first  of  a  trilogy  devoted  to  a  study  of 
what  he  named  "the  vanquished"  (i  vinti),  but 
after  the  second  of  the  series,  Mastro-don  Gesualdo 
(1888),  he  appears  to  have  abandoned  the  project. 

In  Verga's  novels  there  seems  to  exist  a  certain 
parallel  to  the  labors  of  Thomas  Hardy,  whose 
life,  too,  ran  parallel  to  the  great  Italian's.  In  both 
the  same  underlying  pessimism,  in  both  the  sanx* 
masked  pity.  Signor  Linati  has  also  suggested 
Verga's  affinity  to  Synge,  for  his  deep  insight  into 
the  lives  of  the  humble  fisherfolk.  By  these  tokens 
we  are  in  the  presence  of  a  figure  whose  influence 
among  the  newer  novelists  will  prove  strong  and 
salutary. 

Verga's  atmosphere  is  naturally  in  good  measure 
that  of  his  native  scene,  where  life  is  liv^d  amidst 
a  ferocious  intensity  of  passions  and  a  crushing 
belief  in  fate.  His  so-called  impersonality  should 
not  mislead  his  readers,  however.  "It  is  not  to 
comply  with  a  Flaubertian  aesthetics,"  writes  Luigi 
Russo  in  his  recent  book  upon  Verga,  "that  the 
author  of  Cavalleria  Rusticaua  tries  not  to  intervene 
in  his  tale;  it  is  because  his  model,  the  Sicilian 
peasant,  is  convinced  that  he  himself  does  not  inter- 
vene in  the  conduct  of  his  own  life." 

Verga's  position  as  a  dramatist  is  secondary,  yet 
Ruberti  accords  to  the  stage  version  of  Cavalleria 


ITALY  143 

Rusticana  an  importance  to  Italian  dramaturgy 
comparable  to  the  significance  of  /  Malavoglia  to 
the  Italian  novel.  "The  entire  theatrical  produc- 
tion of  Giovanni  Verga,"  he  writes,  "is  contained 
in  a  little  volume  of  pocket  size,  about  four  hundred 
pages  long;  yet  there  will  come  a  day  when  we'll 
go  back  to  it  to  discover  inside  the  sincerest  and 
most  artistic  representation  of  life  that  our  theatre 
produced  toward  the  close  of  the  nineteenth  century." 

Perhaps  that  praise  is  a  tribute  rather  than  a 
criticism,  yet  the  one-act  Cavalleria  Rusticana  is  a 
gem  of  its  kind.  This  should  not  be  confused  with 
the  libretto  of  the  opera,  which,  though  true  to  the 
tale  of  the  play,  necessarily  leaves  out  those  very 
qualities  that'  make  of  the  original  a  miniature 
masterpiece.  The  drama,  first  produced  in  Rome 
in  1884,  with  Duse  in  the  role  of  Santuzza,  imme- 
diately created  a  deep  impression  because  of  its 
spontaneous  presentation  of  life  in  the  raw.  Here, 
in  the  words  of  Renato  Simoni,  we  have  a  "hundred 
dramas  in  a  single  act."  Nor  is  the  statement 
merely  another  sample  of  Latin  rhetorical  exaggera- 
tion. In  all  of  Verga's  work  for  the  stage  the  ele- 
mental theme  is  love;  he  is  most  successful  when 
nearest  to  the  primal  substratum  of  passion.  The 
one  excursion  into  what  an  anemic  social  class  calls 
love  was  made,  I  believe,  in  his  Caccia  alia  Volpe 
[The  Fox-Hunt)^  which  is  itself  a  puny,  anemic 
performance.  French  subtleties  of  irridescent  amour- 
ettes were  not  for  Verga's  vigorous  middle  years. 
For  the  rest,  he  seemed  to  prefer  the  succinct  form, 
so  that  later  plays,  such  as  In  Portirneria^  Caccia 
al  LupOy  La  Lupa^  are  not  full  length. 

It  is  in  the  presence  of  a  simple  play  like  Caval- 


144       THE  DRAMA  OF  TRANSITION 

leria  Rusticana  that  one  person,  ut  least,  feels  the 
inadequacy  of  the  Dukes-Jameson  aristocratic  theory 
of  the  clrama.  These  are  simple  folk,  humble, 
"vanquished"  souls  that  struck  their  creator  from 
the  first  with  a  sense  of  their  stark  significance.  In 
\'erga,  like  the  eternal  modern  that  he  is,  nothing 
is  settled;  he  is  enigmatic,  sphinx-like.  And  so, 
too,  his  characters,  out  of  whose  very  dumbness 
rises  the  eloquence  of  human  symbols.  Rustic 
Chivalry  leaves  one  with  a  haunting  sense  of  a  fate 
that  overhangs  us  all;  not  a  Greek  fate,  but  a  fate 
that  courses  in  our  veins  and  laughs  at  our  puny 
institutions  and  our  solemn  ring  of  defenses  against 
the  incursions  of  the  originary  beast.  For  a  simple, 
powerful  miniature  such  as  this,  one  could  easily 
spare  the  numerous  "triumphs"  of  a  later  Nicco- 
demi,  the  lucubrations  of  grotesque  mummers  whose 
present  virtue  lies,  not  in  accomplishment,  but  in  a 
search  for  new  paths. 

/;;  Portineria  {At  the  Porter  s  Lodge)  is  a  pathetic 
little  play  in  which  all  the  trouble  is  caused  by  love 
misplaced.  Now  it  is  the  sickly  sister  Malia  who  is 
fond  of  Chiarini;  but  Chiarini  loves  the  other  sister, 
who,  in  turn,  places  her  affections  elsewhere.  And 
thus  the  chain  of  unhappiness  is  forged  link  by 
link,  fettering  them  all  to  misery.  La  Lupa  {The 
She-lVolJ)  is  an  unrelenting  portrayal  of  a  mother 
who  pursues  the  husband  of  her  daughter.  Of  the 
two  dramatic  sketches  The  IVolJ-Huyit  and  The 
Fox-Hunt^  The  If'olf-Hunt  is  easily  the  better;  just 
as  in  /;;  Portineria  the  various  links  of  tnie  and 
virtuous  love  combine  to  make  a  chain  of  unhappi- 
ness, so  here  the  links  of  illicit  passion  unite  in  a 
chain  of  evil.     It  would  seem  that  to  Verga  there 


ITALY  145 

is  something  in  the  very  nature  of  passion  which 
foredooms  its  victims  to  misfortune,  whether  that 
passion  burgeon  in  the  heart  of  the  pure  or  burn 
in  the  bosom  of  the  transgressor.  The  wolf  of  The 
Wolf-Hunt  is  a  man  who  has  deserted  one  woman 
to  pay  attentions  to  the  wife  of  another  man;  when 
trapped,  however,  his  first  concern  is  not  to  shield 
or  to  save  the  wife,  but  to  rescue  his  own  hide.  The 
fox-hunt  of  the  second  sketch  shows  the  comic 
aspect  of  the  same  situation,  but  Verga  is  here  on 
unfamiliar  or  unattractive  ground. 

Verga  found  no  followers;  it  is  as  a  personality 
rather  than  as  a  model  that  he  is  to-day  a  power 
among  the  small  band  of  artists.  There  is,  in  his 
labors,  a  tonic  elementalism  that  makes  for  the 
illusive  permanence  of  literary  glory;  his  Cavalleria 
Rusticana^  at  least,  will  long  be  a  focal  point  in  the 
story  of  the  Italian  drama. 

ENRICO  LUIGI  MORSELLI 

The  short  Hfe  of  Morselli  (i 882-1921)  was  as 
checkered  as  it  could  be  made  by  a  youthful  thirst 
for  adventure,  a  goading  poverty,  and  an  underly- 
ing spiritual  restlessness.  Born  at  Pesaro,  he  was 
early  taken  by  his  parents  to  Modena  and  soon 
thence  to  Florence.  Here  he  finished  the  courses 
given  at  the  elementary  schools  and  advanced  to 
the  university,  where  for  two  years  he  devoted  him- 
self to  the  study  of  medicine  and  letters,  which, 
judging  solely  from  contemporary  literature,  seem 
to  have  a  powerful  affinity  for  one  another.  He 
took  no  degree,  but  his  intercourse  with  such  minds 
as  Papini  and  Prezzolini  helped  to  sharpen  his  wits, 
and  later,  when  he  needed  a  little  friendly  notice, 


146       THE  DRAMA  OF  TRANSITION 

Papini  beat  the  drum  for  him  with  those  sharp, 
staccato  thumps  for  which  he  is  noted — or  was 
noted,  before  the  astounding  conversion  that  is 
signalized  in  his  recent  Storia  di  Cristo.  To  Papini, 
indeed,  Morselli  owes  not  a  little  for  his  crossing 
of  the  Italian  border  and  for  exaltation  as  a  writer 
of  modern  tragedy  that  lifts  him  clearly  above  both 
D'Annunzio  and  Sem  Benelli. 

"Morselli,"  wrote  Papini  of  the  tragedy  Glauco 
in  one  of  the  numbers  of  the  short-lived  Lm  I 'rate 
Italic^ — a  monthly  published  by  him  in  French  for 
the  dissemination  of  a  broader  knowledge  of  Italian 
cultural  life — "does  not  follow  pedantically  the 
elaborated  myths  and  the  learned  reconstructions 
of  the  Hellenists.  He  is  not  a  patient  and  boresomc 
archcvologist  like  D'Annunzio;  he  cares  very  little 
for  erudite  bric-a-brac,  for  local  color,  for  the  scenery 
and  supernumeraries  that  serve  to  conceal  the  im- 
potency  of  the  impotent.  He  penetrates  to  the 
very  core  of  the  psychological  action  and  into  the 
very  soul  of  his  personages.  .  .  .  He  transports 
us  into  a  magic  world  that  is  almost  outside  of  time, 
but  in  that  mythical  and  prehistoric  world  we  be- 
hold men  who  suffer,  love,  who  betray,  who  take 
pleasure  with  the  puissant  frankness  of  elemental 
humanity.  He  uses  the  myth  so  as  to  obtain  a 
superior  lyric  freedom  that  shall  permit  him  to 
depict  life  in  its  very  essence.  He  thus  stands 
apart  from  all  the  makers  of  classic  pastiches  with 
which  our  literature  has  been  infested  from  the 
sixteenth  century  down  to  D'Annunzio  and  Benelli." 

It  is  easy  to  see  that  Papini  was  here  quite  as 
much  interested  in  damning  his  pet  aversions  as  in 
praising  the  most  noted  of  his  friend's  productions. 


ITALY  147 

The  trumpet-blast,  however,  did  reveal  Morselli  to 
the  outside  world. 

According  to  the  evidence  available,  Morselli's 
life  at  Florence  was  a  strange  admixture  of  ardent 
study  and  wild  debauch.  In  his  twentieth  year,  in 
company  of  his  friend  Valerio  Ratti,  he  suddenly 
launched  upon  a  sea  voyage,  and  before  he  returned 
to  Florence  he  had  wandered  from  Capetown  to 
Buenos  Aires,  to  Cornwall,  to  London,  to  Paris, 
earning  his  living  now  by  his  pen,  now  by  the  most 
cheeky  imposture.  Once  back  in  Italy — "the  most 
penitent  and  happy  of  prodigal  sons" — Morselli 
founded  a  large  commercial  and  industrial  review 
called  Mercurio^  which  ran  for  no  less  than  five 
years  and  died  of — honesty.  In  order  to  marry  he 
was  compelled  to  borrow  150  lire  to  proceed  with 
the  ceremony;  this  was  but  the  beginning  of  straits 
that  brought  him  often  the  pangs  of  hunger.  His 
mind  reverted  to  writing,  and  the  result  was  that 
peculiar  little  book  called  Favole  per  i  re  d'oggi 
{Fables  for  the  Kings  of  Today).  Here  we  encounter 
just  that  combination  of  the  ancient  and  the  con- 
temporary that  strikes  the  reader  of  his  tragedies; 
there  is,  moreover,  a  certain  cynical  outlook  upon 
life,  a  philosophic  scorn  of  man  the  individual  that 
so  often  companions  a  love  of  him  in  the  abstract. 
(Was  it  not  Mephisto  who,  in  W.  S.  Gilbert's  little- 
known  adaptation  of  Faust  called  Gretchen  inveighed 
against  the  holy  tribe. 

Who  pray  for  mankind  in  the  aggregate 
And  damn  them  all  in  detail!) 

The  encouraging  reception  of  the  book  resulted 
in  the  composition  of  the  one-act  Acqua  sul  Fuoco 


148       THE  DKAMA  OF  TR.-\NSITION 

{Water  Upon  Fire),  a  charming  little  piece,  compar- 
able for  its  sentiment,  its  irony,  and  its  tenderness 
to  Pirandello's  Sicilian  Limes.  The  play  made  very 
little  impression,  and  Morselli  returned  to  Pesaro 
convinced  that  he  had  not  been  cut  out  for  a 
dramatist.  His  next  refuge  was  poetry,  and  he 
set  about  the  writing  of  Orione,  his  first  tragedy, 
which  is  poetic  not  in  the  n:vrow  sense  of  rhymes 
and  meters,  but  in  the  ampler  one  o\  outlook,  at- 
mosphere, implication.  Originally  produced  in  1910, 
it  made  the  tour  of  Milan,  Trieste,  Modcna,  and 
Florence.  The  author,  who  was  encountering  plenty 
of  opposition  among  his  fellow-craftsmen,  was  ac- 
cused of  classicism,  and  perhaps  to  refute  the 
charge  wrote  the  modern  play  Lui  Prigionc  {The 
Prison),  which  Tina  di  Lorenzo  acted  in  Milan, 
Turin,  Florence,  and  South  America.  Close  upon 
this  followed  //  Domatore  Gastone,  an  a^nusing  one- 
act  skit,  in  which  an  animal-tamer  finds  his  haz- 
ardous occupation  quite  pacific  in  comparison  with 
the  taming  of  two  determined  young  skirted  animals 
of  a  more  closely  related  species. 

Soon  we  discover  Morselli  in  the  "movies"  as  an 
actor,  and  he  readily  advances  to  the  position  of 
director.  The  war,  however,  cuts  short  his  cinemat- 
ographic ventures.  His  noted  tragedy  Glauco  is 
now  beginning  to  take  shape;  he  reads  the  first 
draught  to  the  composer  Franchetti,  who  is  so 
struck  with  it  that  he  immediately  acquires  the 
rights  to  set  it  to  music.  A  period  of  illness  inter- 
venes, and  it  is  not  until  he  is  out  of  the  sanatorium 
that  Morselli  writes  the  final  draught  in  twenty 
days  at  Blevio.  He  leaves  the  sole  copy  in  the  com- 
partment of  a  raib-oad  car,  and  it  is  recovered  only 


ITALY  149 

after  a  campaign  of  telephone  calls  and  telegrams. 
From  one  manager  to  another  it  travels  until  at 
last  it  is  produced  through  the  enterprise  of  Vir- 
gilio  Talli  and  acted  in  triumph  by  Annibale  Be- 
trone,  proving  to  be  the  greatest  success  since 
Benelli's  La  Ceria  delle  Befe  {The  Supper  of  Jests). 
The  furore  created  by  Glauco  led,  of  course,  to  the 
repubhcation  of  Morselli's  other  labors;  he  had  al- 
ready been  working  upon  two  tragedies,  Dafne  e 
Cloe  and  Belfagor;  now  he  considered  a  new  modern 
play  as  well,  to  be  called  LIncontro.  In  191 9  he 
was  awarded  the  government  prize  of  6,000  lire  for 
Glauco^  and  his  future  seemed  assured.  Declining 
health,  however,  led  to  his  early  death  from  tubercu- 
losis of  the  lungs. 

Morselli's  fiction  comprises  the  Favole  per  i  re 
d'oggi,  Storie  da  ridere  .  .  .  e  da  piangere  {Tales 
for  Laughter  .  .  .  and  Tears) ^  and  II  trio  Stefania. 
The  fables,  as  we  have  seen,  are  filled  with  cyni- 
cism, irony,  bantering  mockery.  Beneath  the  sneers 
is  a  spirit  of  tolerance  and  a  withdrawal  that  enables 
the  author  to  consider  his  fellow-men  as  if  he  were 
a  god  endowed  with  a  sense  of  laughter  and  of 
human  frailties.  The  tales  for  laughter  and  for 
tears  are  not  divided  into  those  meant  for  pleasure 
and  those  written  to  agitate  the  emotions.  The 
title,  I  imagine,  signifies  that  each  tale  contains 
both  elements  in  a  very  human  blend.  As  the 
writer  declares  in  that  strange  tale  Italien,  Liebe, 
Blut! — a  German  ytovel  left  half  completed  through  my 
own  good  offices — "I  was  made  that  way:  I  would 
laugh  and  laugh,  yet  at  bottom  I  took  everything 
seriously,  even  as  now,  when  I  no  longer  laugh." 

The    man    is,    then,    fundamentally    ironic    and 


150       THE  DRAMA  OF  TRANSITION 

symbolic  in  his  outlook  upon  life.  This  does  not 
have  to  be  read  into  his  lines;  it  is  there,  in  body 
and  in  spirit,  often  in  the  very  title.  Even  his 
modern  play.  La  Prigiont\  is  thus  symbolic,  stand- 
ing for  the  mental  torture  and  confinement  of  sus- 
taining a  family-lie,  of  "putting  on  a  front."  It  is 
written  in  the  vein  of  Giacosa,  but  tinted  through- 
out with  the  dramatist's  personal  methods.  As  to 
Orione  and  Glatico^  the  first,  written  about  ten  years 
earlier  than  the  second,  is  not  so  good,  because  of 
its  diffuseness  and  because  it  carries  less  poetic 
conviction.  The  symbolism  is  less  effective,  and 
while  the  action  is  excellent  in  scenes,  it  is  neither 
so  cumulative  nor  so  climactic  as  in  the  later  play. 
Orione,  the  god,  is  less  impressive  than  Glauco,  the 
seeker,  and  Merope  is  less  colorful  than  Glauco's 
sweetheart,  Scylla. 

Morselli's  tragedies  are  both  singularly  free  of 
scenic  trappings  and  rhetorical  inflation.  There  is 
a  beautiful  simplicity  in  his  language  which  one 
need  not  be  an  Italian  to  appreciate.  He  writes  a 
prose  that  is  akin  to  poetry  without  being  of  that 
vapory,  deliquescent  variety  considered  by  some 
"poetic".  He  knows  the  secret  of  a  broad,  rhythmic 
action  in  which  the  pictorial,  the  dramatic,  and  the 
vocal  blend  into  a  meaningful  harmony.  Out  of 
two  classic  myths  he  creates  two  modern  symbols. 
Glaucus  is  a  Sicilian,  in  love  with  Scylla,  and  hears 
the  sirens  and  tritons  summon  him  to  that  wealth 
and  glory  of  which  he  dreams;  to  him  glory  is  even 
more  than  Scylla,  and  so  great  is  her  love  that  she 
helps  him  rob  her  father,  that  the  foundations  of 
his  venture  may  be  assured.  Ofl^  fares  Glaucus  on 
his  eager  quest,  resisting  temptation  on   the  way, 


ITALY  151 

returning  successful  only  to  find  Scylla  dead.  Just 
as  Glaucus  symbolizes,  in  its  beautiful  simplicity, 
the  great  cost  at  which  fame  is  purchased,  so  Orion 
reveals  in  similar,  though  less  effective  fashion,  the 
littleness  of  man  before  the  powers  of  nature  and 
of  death.  Orion,  earth-born,  and  defying  all  earth's 
creatures,  after  slaying  the  monster  of  the  forest, 
dies  from  the  sting  of  a  scorpion  that  he  deems  be- 
neath his  notice.  Morselli,  in  these  plays,  has  re- 
newed eternal  truths  for  us.  That  is  perhaps  the 
essence  of  enduring  art. 

Some  Italian  critics  have  objected  to  the  sym- 
bolic interpretation  of  these  two  plays  in  particular. 
Yet  surely,  even  considering  the  tragedies  in  the 
strictest  manner  that  so  exacting  a  philosopher  as 
Benedetto  Croce  would  require,  one  is  justified  in 
noting  the  symbols  that  the  author  has  unmis- 
takably put  into  them  as  part  of  his  personality 
rather  than  as  a  predetermined  intention.  And  so 
considered,  Orione  breathes  a  sense  of  man's  help- 
less position  in  the  face  of  nature's  immutable  laws, 
even  as  Glauco  suggests  man's  tardy  recognition 
that  glory  is  less  than  love.  "Qualunque  vita  e 
abietta  si  e  fatta  al  solo  scopo  di  vivere!  .  .  .  e  qual- 
unque  vita  e  santa  se  un  fine  I'illumina!  .  .  ." 
exclaims  Jacopo  in  La  Prigione.  "Any  life  is  base 
if  it  be  concerned  only  with  living,  and  any  life  is 
holy  if  a  purpose  illumine  it."  We  have  Morselli's 
own  word  for  it  that  he  aimed  to  create  a  little 
beauty  through  his  writings,  and  his  interpretation 
of  the  word  "purpose"  by  no  means  signifies  an  ajt 
marred  by  the  obtrusion  of  moraJ  preachment. 

Morselli's  position  in  the  contemporary  letters  of 
his  country  is  not  ajn  inconsiderable  one,  and  already 


152       THE  DR.-\MA  OF  TRANSITION 

secure.  The  triumphant  reception  of  Glauco  by  a 
national  audience  trained  in  the  best  traditions  of 
the  poetic  drama  led  more  than  one  critic  to  behold 
in  the  young  playwright  the  precursor  of  a  new, 
peculiarly  modern,  poetic  tragedy.  Amid  the  ruck, 
of  fantastic  productions  that  infested  the  "gro- 
tesque" theatre,  with  its  pieces  labeled  "visions," 
"confessions",  "parables"  —  anything,  indeed,  but 
drama  or  comedy — Morselli  developed  an  idiom  and 
an  atmosphere  all  his  own.  His  early  death  was  a 
genuine  loss  to  the  Italian  stage,  for  with  D'Annunzio's 
heroics  and  Benelli's  reversion  to  prose  and  apostolic 
mysticism,  Italy  needs  more  than  ever  the  unpreten- 
tious beauty,  the  pure  line,  and  the  harmonious  colors 
that  Morselli  would  have  added  to  its  store.  When 
a  Glauco  or  a  *S'/y  can  appear  so  close  to  one  an- 
other, why,  after  all,  should  artistic  souls  lie  awake 
nights  worrying  about  the  "nationalism"  of  the 
Italian  theatre.'' 

GIOVACCHINU  KORZANO 

Something  of  this  unpretentious  beauty,  this 
color,  this  pure  line,  is  in  the  play  in  verse  that  re- 
cently raised  Giovacchino  Forzano  from  the  ranks 
of  the  opera  librettists  to  the  rarer  precincts  of  the 
poetic  drama. 

It  was  inevitable  that  Slvy  suggested  by  the  In- 
duction to  Shakespeare's  Taming  of  the  Shreu\ 
should,  after  the  triumph  it  won  in  its  native  Italy, 
claim  the  attention  of  the  London  in  which  the 
action  of  the  piece  is  laid.  This  London,  it  is  true, 
is  the  capital  of  the  seventeenth  century's  earlv 
days,  yet  so  successfully  has  the  erstwhile  Italian 
librettist  assimilated   the  mood  and  manner  of  his 


ITALY  153 

subject  that  only  yesterday  London  rose  to  the 
first  English  performances  of  the  play.  It  was  as 
much  of  a  novelty  there  as  in  the  Italy  whence  it 
came,  and  it  should  prove  no  less  appealing  and 
successful  when  Mr.  Belasco  produces  it  here.  It 
has  the  charm  and  poetry  of  a  play  by  Barrie — 
some  of  Christopher  Sly's  own  old  wine  poured  into 
a  new  bottle.  With  this  single  play  Forzano  emerges 
from  the  ranks  of  the  mediocrities  and  justly  lays 
claim  to  such  consideration  as  is  granted  to  artists 
of  creative  imagination.  We  have  the  word  of  so 
practiced  a  playgoer  as  the  dramatist  Marco  Praga 
that  Sly  in  performance  was  an  unmixed  delight. 
Upon  the  printed  page  S/y  is  no  less  a  delight  un- 
mixed. It  has  verve,  body,  glamor,  a  gift  for  robust 
humor  as  for  tender  fancy;  it  can  be  stoutly  coarse 
without  descending  to  ribaldry,  softly  amorous 
without  a  too  noticeable  lapse  into  sentimentality. 
To  Italians  it  must  have  come  as  a  doubly  welcome 
relief  from  heavy  D'Annunzian  vapors  and  Benellian 
harshness  that  had  not  yet  become  apostolic,  as 
well  as  from  the  grotesqueries  above  which  only 
a  Pirandello  and  a  few  others  can  raise  their  heads. 
Forzano  is  no  Rostand,  and  S/y  is  no  Cyrano,  but 
there  are  analogous  external  as  well  as  internal 
reasons  for  the  success  that  greeted  both. 

In  adding  as  subtitle  of  the  play,  "the  Legend  of 
the  Awakened  Sleeper,"  Forzano  consciously  relates 
his  plot  to  the  Oriental  theme  that  made  its  way  in 
one  form  or  another  from  the  Arabian  Nights  into 
Europe,  early  appearing  in  Italy  and  in  such 
Spanish  pieces  as  Calderon's  Life  Is  a  Dream. 
For  the  purposes  of  his  drama  he  adds  to  the  char- 
acters presented  in  the  Shakesperian  Induction  and 


154       THE  DRAMA  OF  TRANSITION 

changes  certain  relationships.  Sly  is  not  here  a 
tinker,  but  a  vagabond  tavern  troubadour;  the 
Elizabethan  jesting  Lord  becomes  the  Count  of 
Westmoreland,  to  whom  For/ano  gives  a  willful, 
wayward  mistress,  Dolly.  The  cniel  deceit  is  car- 
ried out,  as  in  the  second  scene  of  the  Induction, 
but  with  the  added  complications  that  a  Dolly 
(instead  of  Shakespeare's  page  disguised  as  a  woman) 
may  develop.  And  Sly's  fate,  as  we  shall  see,  is 
followed  to  the  end. 

The  Italian  play  is  in  three  acts  and  four  scenes. 
The  Hrst  act  takes  us  to  "The  Hawk's  Tavern," 
where  a  drinking  bout  is  in  progress,  set  off  by  a 
rout  of  chess-players,  bag-pipers,  wags,  and  a  scold- 
ing hostess.  There  is  John  Phikc,  drunk  to  the  gills, 
boasting  of  the  new  part  that  he  is  to  take  in  the 
"tragedy  written  by  my  friend  William  Shake- 
speare"; he  is  to  be  the  first  gravedigger,  and  knows 
his  part  so  well  that  he  has  even  been  able  to  dig 
up  some  of  the  best  bottles  in  the  tavern  cellar 
without  digging  down  into  his  pocket  to  pay  the 
score.  The  drunker  he  gets,  the  more  he  longs  for 
the  rhyming  tippler,  Sly,  his  bosom  pal  and  chorister 
of  the  roisterers.  A  battle  over  his  refusal  to  pay 
is  suddenly  interrupted  by  the  entrance  of  Dolly, 
who,  having  grasped  the  situation,  throws  a  purse 
to  the  hostess  and  restores  quiet.  Dolly,  bored  by 
the  creaking  courtliness  of  her  routine  life  has 
escaped  in  quest  of  adventure;  the  Count,  however, 
knows  her  haunts  and  is  quick  to  trail  her  to  The 
Hawk.  i.'\t  first  he  would  hav^e  her  off  at  once,  but 
the  entreaties  of  the  giiests  and  his  own  need  for 
diversion  prevail  upon  him  and  he  and  his  retinue 


ITALY  155 

remain.  Plake,  moodier  than  ever,  yearns  for  his 
boon  companion.  Of  a  sudden  Sly's  voice  is  heard 
from  the  outside;  he  is  fleeing  from  Snare,  who 
would  lock  him  up  for  unpaid  debts. 

Where  is  that  drunkard 

Of  a  Sly  whom  I  must  lock  up  in  jail? 

Prosaic,  but  fateful  words  these  that  Sly  yet  will 
hear  on  a  rueful  day.  Now,  however,  with  nobility 
for  an  audience,  friends  for  a  chorus,  and  comfort 
flowing  cheerily  from  generous  bottles,  he  is  moved 
to  song,  and  sings  his  lilting  tale  of  the  lovelorn 
bear.  With  new  gulps  come  new  moods,  until  his 
self-pitying  philosophy  rises  from  his  cups: 

But  drink!  drink! 

When  you're  not  drinking, 

Sly,  who  are  you? 

Tell  them,  poor  Sly — these  folks  that  call  you 

Tippler,  drunken  sot! 

A  tavern  minstrel     .     .     .     juggler     .     .     . 

Itinerant  hawker     .     .     .     you  scribble  verses 

For  births,  deaths,  and  marriages     .     .     . 

You're  a  jack  of  all  trades     .     .     . 

Yet  remain  a  sad  wretch! 

A  tatterdemalion! 

Try  to  raise  your  eyes  to  a  beautiful  woman!     .     .     . 

She  laughs  with  compassion !     .     .     . 
Your  home,  your  kingdom, 
Your  paradise:  the  tavern! 

I  would  give    .     .     .    my  life  (now  I  make  you  laugh) 
Just  to  hear 

The  voice  of  a  woman     .     .     .     or  of  a  child 
Say  to  me  {Jie  sobs), 
"Good  day  to  you,  Sly."     {He  drinks  and  kisses  the 

beaker.    He  can  hardly  stand.) 


156       THE  DRAMA  OF  TRANSITION 

You!    You  save  me!    Yes!    When  I  have  drunk 

I  am  transformed! 

And  I'm  a  king! 

Nay!     More  than  king! 

More  than  a  living  creature! 

This  body  of  mine 

Melts  at  the  will  of  fancy! 

And  I  become     ...     a  silver  cloud ! 

I  ride  astride  the  horned  moon 

And  scour  the  heavens  in  quest  of  verses! 

This  Cyrancsque  ()utjK)uring  touches  Dollv's  heart 
and  suggests  to  the  Count  a  pleasant  manner  of 
winding  up  the  evening.  His  plan  quickly  matures, 
and  even  Sly's  companions  are  drunk  en()ut];h  to  see 
the  cream  of  the  jest.  All  hut  Piake,  who  cannot 
drink  in  mock  salutation  to  His  Highness-to-be, 
Chris  Sly. 

The  second  act  transports  us  to  the  Count's 
gilded  palace;  his  attendants  and  Dolly  have  been 
well  instructed  in  the  parts  they  are  to  play  when 
Sly  awakens  from  his  dnmken  stupor.  Sly,  accord- 
ing to  their  plot,  has  been  in  delirious  sleep  for  ten 
years,  during  which  he  has  imagined  himself  to  be 
the  vagabond  versifier  of  his  only  too  real  career, 
Dolly  is  his  sad,  but  prayerful  wife,  who  daily  dur- 
ing these  years  has  besought  heaven  for  his  return 
to  reason.  And  this  is  the  eventful  day  of  that 
return.  Slowly  the  awakened  toper  is  convinced — 
or  perhaps  he  is  yet  drunk  enough  to  see  tnith  in 
the  hoax — and  the  climax  comes  when  he  is  told 
that  even  now  his  wife  is  at  the  little  church  of  the 
castle,  still  praying  and  as  yet  not  apprised  of  his 
miraculous  cure.  From  afar  comes  the  echo-like 
sound   of  her   orisons,   chorused   by   a   murmur  of 


ITALY  157 

feminine  voices  that  support  her  entreaties.  Trum- 
pets and  bells  announce  the  restoration  of  the  sup- 
posed nobleman's  reason,  and  Sly  heads  the  grand 
procession  into  the  great  hall.  This  leads  us  to  the 
second  scene — that  of  the  hall,  into  which  Sly  is 
received  by  a  veritable  chorus  of  the  nobility  and 
its  entourage.  One  thing  is  on  Sly's  mind:  his  wife; 
here  is  the  height  of  the  farce,  and  here  the  height 
of  Sly's  incredulity.  No,  this  must  be  a  dream — 
as  soon  as  he  shall  stretch  forth  his  arms  to  embrace 
her  she  will  vanish  as  so  often  in  the  past.  When 
his  fears  find  poetic  voice — for  is  not  Sly  a  tippling 
troubadour? — Dolly  is  so  affected  by  the  genuine- 
ness of  his  aspirations  that  she  forgets  the  part  she 
has  been  taught  and  begins  to  feel  a  real  response 
to  the  feigned  potentate  who  can  make  love  so 
much  better  than  the  Count.  To  Sly,  who  is  afraid 
that  his  "madness"  will  return  if  he  dares  to  touch 
her,  she  whispers  encouragement: 

Sly  .  .  .  Sly  .  .  .  fear  not  .  .  .  Your  madness 
will  not  return.  ...  I  am  indeed  your  wife.  .  .  . 
{to  calm  him)  and  I  love  you,    ...    I  love  you.    .    .    . 

Again  and  again  she  must  say  the  words,  inciting 
him  to  poetic  delirium.  Still  he  hesitates  to  touch 
her,  while  she  bids  him,  now  feigning  nothing,  not 
to  fear.  "Dare.  .  .  .  Sly  .  .  .  dare.  .  .  ." 
And  Sly  dares.  He  kisses  her,  when  out  of  the 
air  comes  the  voice  of  the  Count,  simulating  that 
of  Snare  in  the  first  act: 

Where  is  that  drunkard 

Of  a  Sly  whom  I  must  lock  up  in  jail? 

The  kiss  is  a  signal  for  the  sudden  appearance  of 
the  courtly  train;  the  laughing  outburst  of  the  con- 


158       THE  DRAMA  OF  TRANSITION 

cealed  nobles  wakes  Sly  rudely  from  a  dream  in- 
deed, but  a  dream  that  has  had  one  incontestable 
reality.  He  refuses  to  be  separated  from  Dtjily, 
whom  he  holds  in  close  embrace. 

You    have    laugheil    me    to   scorn!      You!      You    have 

laughed  me  to  scorn! 
And  you  should  be  condemned 
To  remain  lifelong 

Thus     .     .     .     tight  in  my  arms     .     .     . 
And  under  my  kisses!     .     .     . 

Sly  is  thrust  into  the  cellar,  there  to  ruminate  upon 
his  fall.  The  Count  bids  him  adieu  with  a  derisive 
couplet,  while  Dolly,  leaning  against  the  marble 
balustrade,  watches  the  attendants  through  tear- 
filled  eyes  as  they  drag  the  disillusioned  poet  off 
into  the  gloom. 

The  closing  act  takes  place  in  the  cellar,  where 
Sly  indulges  in  a  long  soliloquy.  Murder  wells  up 
in  his  heart,  and  then  love.  Dolly's  kiss  was  true, 
it  was  sincere. 

In  that  moment     ...     I  vow     .     .     .     that  woman 
That  woman     .    .    .     {finally  daring  to  speak  the  words) 

loved  me! 
She  loved  me!    Yes,  she  loveil  me.     .     .     . 
I  felt  it!    She  loved  me!    .And  now    .    .    .    now    .    .    . 

{as  if  mad  with  joy^  weeping  and  laughing) 
Think,  Sly,  just  think. 
If  this  be  true. 

Something  of  the  jest  remains  with  you. 
The  most  precious  part  is  yours'.     You're  no  longer 

alone! 
The  gloom  of  your  hell  has  been  cleft! 
There  is  a  hope  of  sunlight  even  for  you! 


ITALY  159 

This  is  your  victory! 

Life  is  beautiful,  Sly!     Life  is  beautiful 

Even  for  you! 

Even  for  you ! 

But  how  shall  he  taste  the  fruits  of  this  vengeance, 
this  victory?  He  beholds  visions  of  seeing  Dolly 
again,  of  freeing  her.  Then  follows  the  realization 
of  the  truth.  At  this  very  moment  his  Dolly  may 
be  in  the  arms  of  another.  The  thought  maddens 
him.  Go  back  to  the  tavern?  No.  The  jest  has 
tricked  him  doubly;  it  has  held  out  love  and  snatched 
it  away,  it  has  raised  him  above  his  surroundings. 

Now  I  have  had  a  glimpse  of  paradise,  and  I,  too, 
Demand  my  share!     Yes,  I  demand  it! 

By  the  bottle  he  has  lived;  by  the  bottle  he  shall 
die.  With  a  grim  sense  of  humor  he  breaks  a  bottle 
against  the  stone  table  and  severs  the  veins  of  his 
wrist,  gasping  that  "upon  the  dead  are  placed  the 
emblems  of  their  nobility."  Now  he  will  no  longer 
wake  to  new  delusions;  now  he  may  wish  all.  As 
he  lies  there  dying  Dolly  comes  stealing  in  to  beg 
his  forgiveness  for  the  part  she  played  in  the  cruel 
jest.  At  first  she  does  not  notice  his  condition.  Did 
he  not  feel  that  she  would  come  to  see  him,  she  asks. 
And  soon  she  is  holding  a  dead  man  in  her  arms. 

It  seems  entirely  probable  that  Forzano  began 
this  piece  as  a  libretto  and  soon  saw  that  it  was 
too  good  to  be  drowned  out  by  tones.  In  describ- 
ing it  one  falls  naturally  into  the  jargon  of  Italian 
opera.  As  one  reads,  one  can  easily  pick  out  the 
entrances,  soli,  duets,  choruses,  and  all  the  other 
earmarks  of  conventional  opera.    Dolly's  prayer  be- 


160       THE  DRAMA  OF  TRANSITION 

hind  the  scenes,  accompanied  by  the  feminine 
voices,  is  as  reminiscent  of  //  Trovatore  as  is  Sly's 
pitying  soliloquy  of  /  Pngliacci;  Sly's  song  of  the 
lovesick  bear  has  numerous  relatives  in  the  operatic 
repertory,  although  For/ano  here  has  rendered  it  an 
integral  part  of  the  action,  and  even  a  mirror  of 
Sly's  own  fate,  as  it  is  significantly  parodied  in  the 
second  act.  In  the  reading,  at  least,  the  last  act 
comes  as  a  sort  of  anti-climax;  the  act  consists 
almost  entirely  of  Sly's  farewell  to  the  world,  with 
the  final  appearance  of  Dolly  in  time  to  provide  his 
last  vision  of  Paradise.  Yet  it  links  itself  naturally 
to  all  that  has  gone  before,  and  is  in  sombre  contrast 
to  the  vinous  gayety  of  the  opening  scene  and  the 
cruel  bantering  of  the  second.  The  verse  is  of 
free,  flowing,  spontaneous  character,  never  rigid  or 
academic.  Poetry  sufi^uses  the  whole  from  begin- 
ning to  end  in  company  of  romance  that  runs  the 
gamut  of  the  moods.  Shakespeare's  tinker  here 
becomes  the  symbol  of  man's  fearless  but  futile 
rebellion  against  disillusionment. 

FRANCESCO   V.  MARINETTI 

Marinetti's  futuristic  extravacances,  which  pos- 
sess the  grand  consistency  of  a  philosophic  system 
invading  every  department  of  human  activity,  are 
not  a  phenomenon  apart  in  the  intellectual  hurly- 
burly  of  contemporary  existence.  With  varying 
degree  of  intensity  this  impatient  desire  to  dump 
overboard  the  impedimenta  of  the  past  and  start 
anew,  untramnieled  by  circumspection  or  tradition, 
rises  in  Spain,  in  Germany,  in  France,  under  names 
that  resemble  each  other  only  in  the  "ism"  that 
wags  like  a  frisky  tail  at  the  end.     No  amount  of 


ITALY  161 

insurgent  impatience  and  extravagance  should  ob- 
scure, however,  the  symptomatic  significance  of  the 
strivings;  there  is  a  soul  of  goodness  in  all  things 
evil,  even  in  the  laughing  madness  of  the  Dada- 
ists.  Besides,  who  shall  pretend,  from  a  glimpse 
at  the  source,  to  predict  the  size  of  the  rivers  that 
may  flow  from  it  miles  down  the  mountain  sides? 
The  Futurists  reared  a  numerous  and  a  noisy  brood; 
in  art,  in  poetry,  in  the  drama,  their  impulse  has 
been  felt,  not  permanently  perhaps,  but  perceptibly; 
their  theories  are  as  false  as  any  that  seek  to  en-, 
compass  all  creation  in  a  dogma,  their  performances 
add  strangeness  to  that  inherent  falsity.  It  is  not 
the  "nouveau  frisson"  that  they  seek;  a  thrill  is 
doubtless  too  long  and  must  be  heightened  to  a 
culminating  orgasm.  And  if  it  is  difficult  to  speak 
of  these  newer  "isms"  without  lapsing  into  the 
phraseology  of  the  consultation  room  and  of  the 
psychoanalyst,  it  is  doubtless  because  some  of  the 
proponents  of  the  cults  invite  the  attention  of  the 
neurologist  rather  than  the  scrutiny  of  the  critic. 
All  this  has  been  said  before  of  the  advocates  of 
novelty;  something  in  the  most  curious  and  restless 
of  us  resists  the  suggestion  of  change.  Let  us  note 
down  our  thoughts,  then,  with  becoming  humility, 
and  extract,  from  the  welter  of  newer  activities 
what  seems  most  likely  to  prove  of  productive, 
creative  value.  If  the  new  turns  out  to  be  old,  and 
has  been  advanced  only  on  the  score  of  newness, 
obviously  this  relegates  it  to  the  background;  if  it 
lays  undue  emphasis  upon  the  part  of  a  whole,  again 
obviously  that  excess  should  be  indicated  as  an  ex- 
cess rather  than  as  a  contribution.  If,  again,  there 
is  something  valid  in  the  spirit  of  the  performance, 
11 


162       THE  DRAMA  OF  TRANSITION 

despite  its  artistic  shortcomings,  the  knowledge  is 
important;  it  may  lack  significance  to  art,  but  pos- 
sesses value  for  an  understanding  of  the  artist's 
impulse.  Back  of  all  this  seeming  fatuity  lies  a 
desire  to  escape  from  the  mere  repetition  of  reality 
in  art;  it  is,  in  its  own  way,  part  of  the  protest 
against  narrow  realism  that  is  evidenced  as  much 
in  the  work  of  the  German  F.xprcssionists,  let  us 
say,  as  in  the  stylists  of  the  new  scenery  and  what 
Mr.  Macgowan  has  called  "the  theatre  o\  to- 
morrow." 

Marinetti,  like  his  spectacular  countryman  D'An- 
nunzio,  has  a  gift  for  self-advertisement,  and  came 
to  the  notice  of  the  rest  of  the  world  through  the 
suppression  of  his  novel  Mufarka  the  Futurist  by 
the  Italian  Comstocks.  That  was  about  fourteen 
years  ago,  and  his  acquittal  was  speedily  followed 
(February  20,  1909)  by  a  manifesto  of  Futurism  in 
the  Paris  Figaro.  Since  then,  it  would  seem,  the 
Futurists  have  been  as  busy  with  the  writing  of 
manifestoes  as  with  the  exemplification  of  their 
theories;  it  is  doubtful  whether  anything  that  has 
come  from  them  contains  the  germs  of  permanency 
— to  which,  of  course,  they  might  reply  that  per- 
manency is  anti-futuristic — but  there  is  no  doubt 
that  the  various  manifestoes  make  interesting  read- 
ing. They  are  a  running  commentary  upon  the 
futility  of  contemporary  existence,  expressive  of  a 
violent  reaction  against  every  stabilizing  force  in 
civilization.  Everyone  is  familiar  with  the  Futurist 
proposal  to  abolish  Italy's  past  by  selling  her 
museums  and  art  collections  and  purchasing  with 
the  proceeds  the  newest  engines  of  warfare.  Speed, 
violence,  mob  action,  are  the  new  gods. 


ITALY  163 

With  special  reference  to  the  stage,  the  earliest 
Futurist  pronunciamento  called  for  the  Variety- 
Theatre,  a  mad  hodge-podge  of  acrobatics,  prac- 
tical jokes,  blending  of  the  performers  with  the 
spectators,  caricature,  pantomime,  and  what  not 
under  the  sun  else.  Here,  for  example,  are  some  of 
the  innovations  called  for  by  the  manifesto: 

"The  Variety  Theatre  is  to  have  no  traditions, 
dogmas,  nor  masters,  and  is  to  be  nurtured  upon 
'speedy  actuality.' 

"It  is  to  be  absolutely  practical,  seeking  to  divert 
the  pubhc  with  comical  effects,  erotic  excitation, 
and  imaginative  surprises,  which  must  be  inces- 
santly renewed  by  the  combined  efforts  of  authors, 
actors,  and  stage  hands. 

"It  must  run  the  entire  gamut  of  stupidity,  im- 
becility, absurdity,  thrusting  the  intelligence  in- 
sensibly to  the  very  brink  of  madness. 

"The  Variety  Theatre  is  the  only  one  to  employ 
the  collaboration  of  the  public,  which  does  not 
remain  static,  like  a  stupid  spectator,  but  takes 
boisterous  part  in  the  action,  singing  with  the  per- 
formers, accompanying  the  orchestra,  conversing  in 
improvised  talk  and  bizarre  dialogues  with  the 
actors.  The  latter  are  to  pick  clownish  quarrels 
with  the  musicians. 

"The  Variety  Theatre  uses  the  smoke  of  cigars 
and  cigarettes  to  fuse  the  atmosphere  of  the  audi- 
torium with  that  of  the  stage.  And  since  the  public 
thus  collaborates  with  the  ingenuity  of  the  actor, 
the  action  takes  place  simultaneously  upon  the 
stage,  in  the  boxes,  and  in  the  pit. 

"Such  a  theatre  is  a  school  of  sincerity,  partic- 
ularly instructive  to  the   male,  since  it  exalts  his 


164        THE  DRAMA  OF  TRANSITION 

rapacious  instincts  and  strips  from  woman  all  the 
veils  of  romantic  illusion  that  so  long  have  swathed 
her.  At  the  same  time  it  brings  out  woman's  'ad- 
mirable animal  traits,'  thus  re-establishing  sex  upon 
a  primitive  basis.  It  provides,  moreover,  a  school 
of  heroism,  seeking  to  incite  men  to  break  all  exist- 
ing recortls  tor  athletic  pursuits.  It  is  a  school  of 
subtlety,  of  complications  and  cerebral  synthesis, 
for  its  clowns,  sleight-of-hand  men,  lightning  cal 
culators,  and  the  rest  of  that  tribe;  here  a  single 
dance,  representing  the  discussion  of  diplomatists 
over  the  Morocco  and  the  Congo  questions,  may  be 
the  equivalent  ot  at  least  three  years  of  study  in 
foreign  politics. 

"Love  is  here  to  be  shown  up  for  the  natural 
thing  it  is,  stripped  of  the  romantic  languors,  the 
carnal  obsessions,  the  mysteries,  and  anti-hygienic 
iilealisms  that  have  led  a  parasitic  existence  upon  it. 

"Perspective,  proportion,  time,  and  space  are  an- 
nihilated, together  with  the  Solemn,  the  Sacred, 
the  Sublime  of  .Art  with  a  capital  A."  Psychology 
is  to  be  relegated  to  the  academic  past  whence  it 
spnmg,  and  in  its  stead  is  to  be  enthroned  what 
Marinetti  christens 7?.f/Vo/o///rt,  a  word  constructed  in 
antithesis  to  psychology  and  signifying,  as  the 
opposite  to  mental  order,  physical  abandon. 

If  these  extracts  from  the  manifesto  seem  extrava- 
gant, what  shall  we  say  to  the  detailed  advice  given 
by  its  framer  to  the  operators  of  this  Variety  Theatre? 
The  singers  are  to  be  compelled  to  paint  their  bare 
necks,  their  arms,  and  particularly  to  dye  their 
hair  every  seductive  color;  the  performer  is  to  be 
interrupted  and  made  to  deliver  a  revolutionary 
harangue;  the  seats  are  to  be  covered  with  glue  in 


ITALY  165 

certain  parts  of  the  auditorium,  thus  adding  to  the 
amusement  of  the  spectators  by  the  discomfiture 
of  the  unfortunate  parties;  the  same  seat  is  to  be 
sold  to  some  ten  persons,  thus  making  sure  of  con- 
fusion and  argument;  free  tickets  are  to  be  given 
to  semi-lunatics,  who  will  cause  more  trouble  with 
their  obscene  gestures,  their  pinching  of  women, 
and  other  eccentricities;  powders  provocative  of 
itching  and  sneezing  are  to  be  scattered  about. 

"Prostitute  systematically  upon  the  stage  all 
classical  art,  representing,  for  example,  during  a 
single  evening,  all  the  Greek,  French,  and  Italian 
tragedies  condensed  into  a  ludicrous  potpourri. 
Enliven  the  works  of  Beethoven,  Wagner,  Bach, 
Bellini,  and  Chopin  with  the  interpolation  of  Neapol- 
itan songs.  Represent  side  by  side  on  the  stage 
Zacconi,  Duse,  Mayol,  Sarah  Bernhardt,  and  Fre- 
goli.  Perform  a  Beethoven  symphony  backwards, 
beginning  on  the  last  note.  Reduce  all  Shakespeare 
to  a  single  act.  .  .  .  Have  Rrnani  given  by  actors 
enclosed  up  to  the  neck  in  sacks.  Grease  the  boards 
of  the  stage  so  as  to  ensure  diverting  tumbles  at 
the  most  tragic  moment  of  the  action. 

"Encourage  in  every  way  the  genre  of  the  Amer- 
ican eccentrics,  their  effects  of  exalting  grotesquerie, 
of  horrifying  dynamism,  their  coarse  sallies,  their 
enormous  brutality,  their  trick  vests,  and  their 
pantaloons,  deep  as  the  holds  of  ships,  from  which 
there  will  issue  forth,  with  thousands  of  other  things, 
the  great  futuristic  hilarity  that  will  rejuvenate  the 
face  of  the  world." 

There  is  another,  and  perhaps  more  important 
document  of  the  Futurists  concerning  the  modern 
theatre,  signed  by  Marinetti,  Emilio  Settimelli,  and 


166        THE  DRAMA  OF  TRANSITION 

Bruno  Corra  at  Milan,  January  ii,  1915,  and  Feb- 
ruary 18  of  the  same  year.  They  call  it,  in  direct 
contradiction  of  facts  easily  verifiable,  "our  first 
words  upon  the  theatre." 

This  time  the  Variety  Theatre  is  considered  only 
of  precursory  importance;  the  label  has  become 
Synthetic  P'uturist  Theatre,  "atechnical,  dynamic, 
simultaneous,  autonomous,  alogical,  and  unreal." 
The  war,  which  to  them  was  a  species  of  intensified 
Futurism,  had  strengthened  their  belief  in  the 
theatre  as  a  national  influence.  Ninety  per  cent  of 
the  Italian  people  goes  to  the  theatre,  it  proclaimed, 
while  only  ten  per  cent  reads  books  and  reviews. 
Wherefore — as  if  nothing  else  had  ever  been  said 
previously  upon  the  matter — the  necessity  of  a 
Futuristic  theatre. 

That  theatre  must  be  synthetic,  must  pack  into 
a  few  minutes  and  into  a  few  words  and  gestures 
countless  situations,  feelings,  ideas,  sensations,  facts, 
and  svmbols.  Such  innovators  as  Ibsen,  Maeter- 
linck, Andreiev,  Claudel,  and  Shaw  never  aimed  at 
a  true  synthesis;  at  best  they  are  but  semi-futuristic, 
and  essentially  static.  "We  are  convinced  that, 
mechanically,  through  brevity,  we  can  create  an 
absolutely  new  theatre,  in  perfect  harmony  with 
our  vertiginously  speedy  and  laconic  (sic)  futurist 
sensibility.  Our  acts  must  also  be  instants.  .  .  . 
With  such  an  essential  and  synthetic  brevity  our 
theatre  can  sustain  and  even  overcome  the  com- 
petition of  the  Cinematograph." 

That  theatre  must  be  anti-technical,  opposing 
every  precept  of  the  dramaturgic  text-book  with  its 
imposing  array  of  playcraft.  "We  wish  to  destroy 
Technique,   which    from    the   Greeks   down    to    the 


ITALY  167 

present  day,  instead  of  becoming  more  simple,  has 
waxed  ever  more  dogmatic,  more  stupidly  logical, 
meticulous,  pedantic,  stifling."  Away,  then,  with 
a  hundred  pages  where  one  will  suffice,  simply  be- 
cause the  public  wishes  to  be  convinced  of  the 
reality  of  a  person;  away  with  any  distinction  be- 
tween theatricality  and  untheatricality;  away  with 
villains  and  heroes,  imitation  of  reality,  with  the 
desire  to  explain  the  action  through  minute  logic, 
"when  even  in  real  life  we  can  never  grasp  an  event 
in  its  entirety,  with  all  its  causes  and  consequences, 
since  reality  vibrates  about  us"  in  a  chaotic  con- 
fusion of  inter-related  fragments.  "For  example, 
it  is  stupid  to  represent  upon  the  stage  a  contest 
between  two  persons,  always  in  a  clear,  logical  order, 
while  in  our  actual  experience  with  life  we  find 
almost  exclusively  fragments  of  dispute  which  our 
activity  as  modern  persons  has  brought  to  our 
attention  for  a  moment  in  the  car,  in  a  cafe,  in  a 
station,  and  which  have  remained  filmed  {cinemat- 
ografati)  upon  our  souls  as  dynamic,  fragmentary 
symphonies  of  gestures,  words,  sounds,  and  lights." 
That  theatre  must  be  dynamic  and  simultaneous. 
"We  believe  that  a  thing  is  of  value  according  as  it 
has  been  improvised  (hours,  minutes,  seconds),  and 
not  prepared  for  a  long  time  (months,  years,  cen- 
turies)." And  the  signers  point  out  in  italics  that 
the  greater  part  of  their  plays  have  been  written 
in  the  theatre,  virtually  improvised;  they  pooh-pooh 
Shakespeare,  fall  asleep  over  Ibsen's  lines.  Abso- 
lute dynamism  is  their  program,  through  the  com- 
penetration  of  different  times  and  places.  Hence 
their  simultaneith,,  in  which  time  and  space  are 
abolished. 


168       THE  DRAMA  OF  TR.-\\SITION 

That  theatre  must  be  autonomous,  alogical,  un- 
real. It  is  born  of  (i)  "our  frantic  passion  for  actual 
life,  velocitous,  fragmentar)-,  elegant,  complicated, 
cynical,  muscular,  fleeting,  futuristic;  and  (2)  our 
ultra-modern  cerebral  conception  of  art,  according 
to  which  no  logic,  no  tradition,  no  technique,  no 
opportunism  may  be  imposed  upon  the  genius  of 
the  artist,  who  must  be  concerned  solely  with  the 
creation  of  synthetic  expressions  of  cerebral  energy 
possessing  the  absolute  value  of  novelty." 

Together  with  this  novelty  of  outlook  and  ex- 
ecution comes  a  novelty  of  nomenclature.  Con- 
temporary Italy,  I  believe,  has  more  different  des- 
ignations for  its  dramatic  products  than  any  other 
nation  of  the  Western  world.  Among  these  Mari- 
nettian  novelties  are  the  battiite  in  libertd,  (free  lines; 
i.  e.,  improvisatiorts  by  the  actors);  the  simultaneitd, 
(simultaneity,  in  which  the  action  takes  place  in  a 
fourth-dimensional  world  wherein  time  and  space 
no  longer  exist);  the  compenetraz'tone^  wherein  the  em- 
phasis is  placed  upon  the  interpenetration  of  tem- 
poral and  spatial  elements;  the  poemetto  animato 
(animated  short  poem);  the  sensazione  sceneggiata 
(the  scenified  sensation);  the  ilaritd,  d'talogata 
(hilarious  dialogue),  and  a  similar  array  of  "extra- 
logical  discussions,"  "deformations,"  ad  libitum. 

The  plays  produced  upon  this  plan  have  actually 
been  given  by  various  dramatic  companies  and 
have  been  received  enthusiastically  (if  we  may  credit 
the  manifesto)  by  the  publics  of  many  cities. 

As  to  Marinetti's  own  plays,  we  are  not  here  so 
much  concerned  with  his  La  Momie  Sanglante  {The 
Bleeding  Mummy)  or  his  //  Re  B  aid  or  i  a  {King 
Hubbub,   1909),  which  is  to  me  as  fat  and  fatuous 


ITALY  169 

as  the  fleshly  potentate  whose  gory  exploits  it 
chronicles.  Nothing  of  dynamic  synthesis  about 
this  satire  upon  parliamentarism  that  takes  place 
in  the  realm  of  Block-heads  at  some  undetermined 
epoch  in  the  Middle  Ages.  Nor,  for  that  matter, 
is  there  anything  novel  or  arresting  in  the  longest 
of  the  synthetic  plays  that  Marinetti  issued  in  book 
form  in  1920  under  the  title  of  Elettricita  Sessuale. 
(The  titular  play  was  produced  in  1909  in  a  French 
version.)  Sexual  Electricity  is  a  play  of  facile  sym- 
bolism, the  interpretation  of  which  is  reinforced  by 
the  protagonist,  who  is  named  Marinetti,  thus 
further  indicating  his  spokesmanship  for  the  author. 
Few  dramas  could  be  more  conventional  in  tech- 
nique; it  even  opens  with  an  expository  conversa- 
tion between  two  servants!  Its  purpose  is  to  glorify 
the  Futurist  views  as  to  marriage  and  sex  in  general, 
and  its  satire  is  so  obvious,  so  transparent,  that  it 
amounts  almost  to  direct  harangue.  Far  more  in- 
teresting as  experiemnts  in  the  new  forms  are  the 
short  pieces  that  make  up  the  remainder  of  the 
collection.  Some  of  these  are  little  more  than 
animated  cartoons  of  moral  or  political  import;  they 
employ  the  "flash-back"  methods  of  the  moving- 
picture,  the  "insert"  methods  of  both  film  and  car- 
toon. One  of  them  uses  the  tripartite  stage  of  the 
medieval  theatre  in  which  heaven,  earth,  and  hell 
are  simultaneously  visible.  Another,  called  a  "drama 
of  objects,"  gives  voices  to  inanimate  articles  of 
furniture,  while  a  companion  drama,  not  even  en- 
dowing the  chairs  of  the  action  with  voices,  actually 
manages  to  create  an  atmosphere  of  anticipation  by 
the  shifting  shadows  of  the  chairs  waiting  for  the 
guests  to  arrive.    There  are  "plays"  calling  only  for 


170        THE  DRAMA  Ul-    rRANSITION 

the  appearance  of  hands  in  various  positions  above 
a  stretched  curtain  and  consisting  ot  twenty  direc- 
tions for  the  various  positions;  there  is  neither  con- 
tinuity nor  climax,  the  hands  of  each  "scene"  telling 
their  story  by  their  attitude  alone.  For  example, 
direction  number  3:  "Two  masculine  hands  (of 
different  persons)  clasp  one  another  firnilv;"  num- 
ber I4,  "a  feminine  hand  waves  a  handkerchief  with 
yearnful  languor,  crushed  and  grieving;"  number  19, 
"a  masculine  hand  with  the  forefinger  rigidlv  point- 
ing in  a  position  of  energetic  command."  The  feet 
likewise  have  a  play  to  themselves.  One  of  the 
most  interesting  of  the  pieces,  which  is  two  pages 
long,  consists  solely  of  stage  directions  and  the  rev- 
elation of  an  officer's  room  on  a  summer's  night. 
Here,  literally,  the  picture  tells  the  story. 

As  an  illustration  of  the  plays,  I  translate  one  of 
the  least  esoteric,  called  On  a  Moon/it  Ni^ht^  "alogical 
compenetration."  As  the  author  explains  in  his 
note,  "The  heavy-paunched  man  is  not  a  symbol, 
but  an  anti-logical  synthesis  of  many  sensations:  fear 
of  future  reality,  cold  and  solitude  of  the  night,  vision 
of  life  twenty  years  after,  and  so  on." 

Scene:     A  Garden;  a  Bench. 

He:     What  a  beautiful  night!    Let's  sit  down  here.  .  .  . 

She:     How  fragrant  the  air  is! 

He:  We  are  all  alone,  we  two,  in  this  vast  garden. 
.     .     .     Aren't  you  afraid? 

She:  No  ...  no  ...  I  am  so  happy  to  be 
here  alone  with  you. 

A  Stout,  Heavy-Paunched  Gentleman  {enters  from 
a  side  path^  approaches  the  couple^  sits  down  upon  the  bench 
beside  them.     They  do  not  see  him^  however^  as  if  he  were 


ITALY  171 

invisible):  Hum!  Hum!  {He  stares  at  the  maiden  while 
she  speaks.) 

She:     Did  you  feel  that  breeze? 

The  Stout,  Heavy-Paunched  Gentleman:  Hum! 
Hum!    {He  stares  at  the  young  man  while  the  latter  speaks,) 

He:     It  isn't  the  breeze. 

She:     But  isn't  there  really  anybody  in  this  garden? 

He:  Only  the  watchman  yonder  in  his  cottage.  He's 
asleep.  Come  here,  closer.  .  .  .  Give  me  your  lips. 
...     So. 

The  Stout,  Heavy-Paunched  Gentleman:  Hum! 
Hum !  {Looks  at  his  watch  by  the  light  of  the  moon,  rises, 
walks  about  pensively  in  front  of  the  two  as  they  kiss,  and 
then  sits  down  again.) 

She:     What  a  beautiful  night  it  is! 

He:     How  fragrant  the  air  is! 

The  Stout,  Heavy-Paunched  Gentleman:  Hum! 
Hum! 

He:     Why  do  you  tremble?     Did  something  frighten 


you 


She:     No.     Kiss  me  again. 

The  Stout,  Heavy-Paunched  Gentleman  {looks 
again  at  his  watch  by  the  light  of  the  moon,  rises,  walks  be- 
hind the  bench,  unseen,  and  lightly  touches  first  her  shoulder, 
then  his,  and  disappears  slowly  into  the  background?) 

She:     What  a  shudder! 

He:     It's  getting  somewhat  cold.     .     .     . 

She:     Late,  too. 

He:     Let's  go  in.    What  do  you  say? 

Has  Marinetti  added  anything  to  the  dramatic 
art  v^ith  these  curious  experiments?  Hardly  a  tittle. 
After  all  the  Futuristic  verbiage  about  conventional 
technique,  he  returns  to  it  in  the  titular  piece,  as 
we  have  seen;  there  is  nothing  in  the  other  plays 


172       THE  DRAMA  OF  TRANSITION 

that  has  not  for  decades  formed  the  stock-in-trade 
of  stage  mechanics.  Visions  of  heavenly  beatitudes, 
of  Gretchens  meant  to  alkire  Faiists,  of  fantastic 
dreams,  are  a  commonplace  of  melodrama,  which 
often  has  annihilated  time  and  space  in  precisely 
Marinettian  manner,  though  with  different  inten- 
tions. And  what  is  more  common,  more  of  the 
past,  than  his  arid  allegory  and  symbolism?  In 
these  miniature,  plays,  if  we  may  call  them  such, 
Marinetti  has  achieved  novelty  ot  emphasis  rather 
than  of  matter  or  conception;  he  has  taken  the  part 
for  the  whole. 

The  chief  importance,  then,  of  the  Futurist  attack 
upon  the  contemporary  drama  is  that  it  has  thrown 
a  lurid  light  upon  the  weaknesses  of  conventional 
technique.  Beneath  all  the  nonsense  and  futility 
of  the  Wiriety  Theatre,  beneath  all  the  blatant 
nomenclature  of  the  Synthetic  Flay,  lies  a  valid 
striving  away  from  the  mere  repetition  of  meaning- 
less detail.  Its  strength— as  aspiration,  for  the  ac- 
complishment is  almost  nil — is  polemical,  not  crea- 
tive; negative  rather  than  positive.  It  is  related  to 
the  grinning;  infantilism  of  the  Dada-ists  by  its  laugh- 
ing nihilism,  and  represents,  as  does  the  Dada-ist  im- 
pulse, the  breaking-point  in  the  reaction  against  an 
over-ordered,  over-logical,  formal,  all-too-formal  uni- 
verse. When  all  is  said  and  done,  the  past  is  an  in- 
evitable component  of  present  and  future,  and  the 
Futuristic  mov^ement,  through  its  very  excesses, 
hastened  its  own  descent  into  the  very  past  that  it 
abjured. 


ITALY  173 

THE  "TEATRO  GROTESCO":  LUIGI 
PIRANDELLO  ET  AL 

It  will  be  recalled  that  the  Futurist  movement  in 
the  theatre,  though  it  employed  the  stage  in  an 
effort  to  further  the  war,  was  born  before  the  out- 
break of  the  great  conflict.  So,  too,  was  the  so- 
called  "grotesque"  theatre,  which,  in  its  similar 
reaction  against  conventionality,  resorted  to  methods 
less  extreme,  less  ofi^ensive  to  the  static  bourgeoisie, 
if  at  times  almost  as  disconcerting.  If  to-day  the 
grotesque  theatre  is  not  a  vital  factor  in  Italian 
drama,  and  more  a  symptom  of  artistic  restlessness 
than  a  promise  of  achievement,  it  is  more  important 
potentially  than  the  Futuristic  drama.  Pirandello, 
only  incidentally  a  "grotesquer,"  has  alone  done 
things  that  seem  more  than  ephemeral,  and  despite 
all  that  may  be  urged  against  his  plays,  has  brought 
to  the  Italian  drama  that  breath  of  novelty  which 
the  Futurists,  for  all  their  manifestoes,  could  not 
infuse. 

One  of  its  possible  sources  has  been  traced  to 
Bernard  Shaw— chiefly  on  the  strength,  one  imagines, 
of  the  designations  that  he  has  adopted  for  various 
of  his  plays,  such  as  "a  conversion  in  three  acts," 
"a  debate  in  one  sitting,"  "a  sermon  in  crude  mel- 
odrama." So  do  the  grotesquers  avoid  the  simple 
designation,  in  productions  which,  from  the  stand- 
point of  content  rather  than  nomenclature,  have 
suggested  comparison  with  the  Grand  Guignol. 
Chiarelli's  La  Maschera  e  il  Volto  {The  Mask  and  the 
Face),  which  set  the  movement  a-going,  is  called  a 
"grotesque,"  whence  the  descriptive  adjective  of 
the  school.    Pirandello's  Cosi  ^,  se  vi  pare  (It's  So, 


174       THF  DRAMA  OF  TRANSITION 

If  You  Think  It  Is)  is  subtitled  "a  parable."  LUcello 
del  Paradiso  {The  Bird  of  Paradise),  by  the  young 
and  daring  Enrico  Cavacchioli,  is  denominated  "a 
confession" — ^just  what  sort  we  shall  presently  see. 
And  thus  the  style  flourishes. 

Silvio  d'Aniico'  flouts  the  Shavian  source.  "He 
who  knows  what  truly  constitutes  the  secret  of  the 
Shavian  theatre,"  writes  the  discerning  Italian, 
"the  essentially  moralistic  reasons  behind  his  over- 
turn of  technique  .  .  .  will  hardly  succeed  in 
discovering  any  substantial  identity  between  the 
Christian  spirit  of  the  Irish  writer  and  the  .  .  . 
apparent  frigidity  of  the  Pirandellian  forms,  the  pre- 
vailingly funereal,  lugubrious,  macabrous  tones  of 
the  young  authors,  who  think  of  everything  except 
social  preachment."  This  is,  on  the  whole,  quite  so. 
Yet  in  Pirandello  especially,  and  from  the  very  be- 
ginning, there  are  social  implications.  What  is 
more,  a  rather  close  comparison  of  the  Irishman  and 
the  Italian  would  bring  to  light  a  certain  underlying 
Christianity  in  both.  D'Amico  is  nearer  to  the  true 
state  of  afl^airs  when  he  declares  that  the  new  dram- 
atists can  no  longer  believe  in  their  own  creatures — 
a  phenomenon  surely  not  limited  to  the  stage  nor 
to  latter-day  Italy.  "Finding  themselves  compelled 
to  write  in  a  time  in  which,  according  to  the  assur- 
ances of  the  well-informed,  all  possible  stage  situa- 
tions have  been  used  .  .  .  they  try  a  new  game. 
They  take  the  old  situations  and  try  to  lend  them 
new  flavor  by  forcing  some  of  the  elements  (Chiarelli) 
by  decentralizing  them  (Cavacchioli,  Antonelli),  by 
grouping  them  into  a  violent  synthesis  (Rosso  di 
San  Secondo).    ...    In  substance  this  is  a  mechan- 

'  See  his  very  interesting  //  Teatro  dei  fantocci,  Vallechi  Editore,  Firenze. 
(No  date.) 


ITALY  175 

ical  game,  which  in  the  end  confers  upon  the  plays 
the  single  trait  truly  common  to  this  entire  theatre 
— a  marionette-like  concentration."  The  more  to 
impress  this  point  the  critic  indicates  that  the  very 
name  "Guignol"  comes  from  the  corruption  of  Chig- 
nol — a  Bolognese  puppet  transplanted  to  France. 
Your  "grotesque"  play,  moreover,  though  "humor- 
istic,"  is  not  necessarily  an  hilarious  affair;  it  may 
hold  as  many  thrills  as  any  Grand  Guignol  "nerve- 
wrecker,"  but  the  thrills — and  possi-bly  we  have  here 
a  true  distinction  between  the  two  types — may  be 
cerebral  as  well  as  physical.  That  is,  the  interest 
may  be  centered  not  alone  upon  events  but  upon 
the  confusion  of  thought,  the  bewilderment  of  atti- 
tude induced  by  them. 

As  an  example  of  the  more  obvious  type  of  "gro- 
tesque" play,  I  would  give  the  original  form  of  Fausto 
Maria  Martini's  Ridi^  Pagliaccio^  a  one-act  play 
suggested  by  the  clown  of  Leoncavallo's  opera. 

We  are  introduced  to  the  waiting-room  of  a  very 
modern  nerve  specialist.  Several  patients  are  await- 
ing their  turn,  and  with  that  companionship  which 
the  discussion  and  exchange  of  symptoms  so  often 
develops  in  sufferers  of  more  or  less  imaginary  ail- 
ments, they  converse  about  their  pet  maladies, 
much  to  the  perturbation  of  Federico,  Professor 
Gambella's  assistant.  That  worthy,  who  has  picked 
up  a  scrap  here  and  there  of  neuropathological 
knowledge,  is  certain  that  this  verbal  contagion  of 
nervous  symptoms  is  bad  for  the  patients;  they 
must  tell  their  troubles  to  the  doctor  alone.  Among 
the  patients  is  one  who  is  sunk  into  a  chair,  as  if 
on  the  verge  of  complete  collapse.  Another,  il 
Cavaliere  Strappa,  begins  a  windy  relation  of  his 


176        THE  DRAMA  OF  TRANSITION 

particular  mania  to  a  woman  patient  at  his  side. 
He  cannot  resist  the  temptation  to  laugh  at  every- 
thing; no  matter  what  he  beholds  he  is  at  once 
seized  with  an  uncontrollable  impulse  to  shriek 
with  mirth;  he  beholds  everything  through  grotesque 
spectacles.  He  has  come  to  Professor  Gambella  in 
the  hope  that  this  torturing  malady  may  be  al- 
leviated. 

The  patient  who  hitherto  has  listened  in  silence 
approaches  the  couple;  he  begs  their  pardon;  he  has 
been  attracted  by  the  nature  of  their  discussion, 
which,  under  the  circumstances,  he  could  not  help 
overhearing.  Signor  Strappa's  malady  interests  him 
exceedingly;  all  the  more  so,  intlccd,  because  it  is 
the  very  reverse  of  his  own.  He,  jx^or  fellow,  has 
lost  his  power  of  laughter;  whatever  he  gazes  upon 
at  once  is  transformed  into  a  source  of  tears. 

.At  last  comes  the  turn  for  this  gentleman's  inter- 
view with  the  psychiatrist.  His  name  is  Giovanni 
Scheffi.  The  doctor,  quite  cocksure  in  his  powers 
of  divination,  puts  him  down  for  a  man  of  leisure, 
since  hard-working  folk  cannot  afford  the  luxury  of 
mental  ailments.  Scheffi  f)ffers  no  contradiction. 
He  submits  to  the  tests  necessary  to  discover  his 
nervous  reactions  and  patiently  awaits  the  doctor's 
verdict.  It  is  a  serious  case;  fortunately  he  has 
come  in  time;  his  chief  remedy  lies  within  himself, 
in  his  own  will-power.  He  must  above  all  things, 
avoid  the  suggestions  of  the  disagreeable,  the  sad. 
He  must  not  permit  lugubrious  friends  to  cross  his 
threshold;  he  must  seek  amusement,  and  center  all 
his  efforts  upon  extracting  the  humorous  from  his 
daily  surroundings.  Oh,  yes,  let  him  be  sure  to  see 
the  pair  of  clowns  that  go  under  the  name  of  Flick 


ITALY  177 

and  Flock  at  the  Eden — the  third  number  of  the 
program.  At  this  juncture  Scheffi  turns  suddenly 
pale,  and  the  doctor  fears  he  has  had  another 
nervous  attack,  but  the  patient  assures  him  that  it 
is  nothing.  Whereupon  the  doctor  resumes  his 
eulogies  of  Flick  and  Flock  as  purveyors  of  curative 
laughter — especially  Flick.  Yes,  yes;  take  that 
"number"  in  and  the  cure  is  effected.  "To-morrow 
you'll  come  back  to  me  and  say,  'Dear  doctor,  I 
laughed  all  evening.  .  .  .'  And  if  you  succeed  in 
laughing  for  an  entire  evening,  the  victory  over 
your  nerves  is  won.  You  no  longer  need  me;  you 
are  cured.  Why,  last  night  the  contagion  of  laughter 
was  so  great  that  .  .  .  the  walls  of  the  auditorium 
simply  shook.  Flick's  comical  powers  are  so  deep 
and  so  persuasive  that  they  extend  beyond  the  limits 
of  the  performance.  When  you  leave  the  theatre 
.  .  .  you  catch  yourself  laughing  for  no  reason  at 
all.  Just  imagine,  last  night  a  certain  recollection 
of  the  performance  came  to  my  mind  and  the  first 
thing  I  knew  I  found  myself  sitting  up  in  the  bed 
laughing  away  like  a  child.  What  had  happened? 
There  was  the  shadow  on  the  wall  in  the  very  form 
of  Flick's  snout,  grinning  right  at  me!    .     .     ." 

The    patient    has    become    increasingly    nervous; 
the  doctor  again  questions  him: 

Gambella:     But   you   are   ill.     What's   the   matter? 
Another  nervous  attack? 

Scheffi  {utterly  dejected):     Ah!     This  is  too  much! 
Too  much! 

Gambella:    But  what's  the  trouble? 

Scheffi:     The  trouble  is  that  I  shall  never  again  be 
able  to  look  upon  that  fellow,  Flick,  who  gave  you  such 


178       THE  DR.AMA  OF  TRANSITION 

pleasure  last  night.  Because  that  clown,  ilear  professor — 
1  am  that  clown,  I  myself.     .     .     . 

{Gambella  is  stiomed  at  the  news.  The  two  men  look  at 
each  other.     The  professor  regains  his  composure.) 

Gambella:  You?  You?  I  am  thunderstruck.  I  must 
admit  that,  as  a  man  of  science,  this  time  I  committed  a 
silly  blunder. 

ScHEFFi  {weeping):  Now  you  understajid  that  I 
couldn't  have  toKl  you,  because  if  I  had,  I  would  have 
run  the  risk  of  not  being  taken  seriously. 

{There  is  a  knock  at  the  door.    Federico  enters.) 

Federico:  Professor!  Professor!  Madame  Giabutti 
has  had  one  of  her  regular  epileptic  attacks.  Will  you 
see  her  now? 

Gambella:     Prepare  some  Valerian. 

{Gambella  follows  Federico;  Scheffi  is  left  alone  upon  the 
stage,  still  weeping.) 

Scheffi  {raising  his  face,  which  is  bathed  with  tears): 
This,  then.     .     .     . 

{He  strides  with  his  accustomed  bounding  step  toward  the 
large  hall  mirror  at  the  rear,  and  greedily  begins  to  evoke 
his  image  there.  It  seems  that  he  finds  it  difficult  to  rec- 
ognize himself.  He  sits  down,  then  suddenly  jumps  up, 
kicks  the  chair,  which  is  overturned,  and  begins  to  execute 
before  the  looking-glass  the  twists  and  turns  that  he  has 
regularly  performed  at  his  cafe.  In  the  meantime  il  Cav- 
aliere  Strappa  enters  through  the  door  at  the  left,  and  seeing 
that  the  doctor  is  occupied  with  Madame  Giabutti,  he  ex- 
claims:) 

Strappa:  I  can't  get  to  see  him  to-day.  I'll  return 
to-morrow.  {He  crosses  the  room  and  surprises  Scheffi  in 
his  clown-like  performance,  and  while  Scheffi,  with  his 
nose  thrust  against  the  surface  of  the  mirror  cries:  ''Flick, 
Flick,  I  alone  will  be  unable  to  look  you  in  the  face,"  Strappa 
nods  as  if  he  understands,  walks  to  the  door  at  the  right  and 
says  to  himself:) 


ITALY  179 

Strappa:  He's  not  a  hypochondriac.  That  man's 
crazy ! 

Such  is  the  end  of  the  playlet,  which  I  translate 
from  the  printed  version  now  before  me;  judging 
from  the  reports  of  the  critics,  the  stage  version  ends 
with  the  clown's  suicide.  It  is  easily  seen  that  for 
the  stage  such  a  definite  conclusion  is  more  effective, 
more  "grotesque."  Here  indeed  we  have  the  Grand 
Guignol  formula  adapted  to  the  purpose  of  intel- 
lectual as  well  as  physical  shudders. 

La  Maschera  e  il  Volto,  by  Luigi  Chiarelli,  was  pre- 
sented by  him  in  191 5  as  a  "grotesque,"  whence, 
as  we  saw,  the  name  of  the  entire  school.  The 
plot  is  that  of  a  husband  who  has  been  outraged  in 
his  marital  rights.  His  view  upon  such  matters  is 
rigid;  indeed,  quite  comparable  with  the  "point  of 
honor"  that  so  long  clamped  its  virtues  upon  the 
Spanish  stage.  His  duty,  clearly,  is  to  slay  his  faith- 
less wife.  What  is  he  to  do,  however,  if  his  courage 
is  not  equal  to  his  sense  of  duty.^  He  conspires  with 
his  own  wife  to  have  it  appear  that  he  has  slain  her! 
She  leaves  for  foreign  parts  and  Paolo  delivers  him- 
self up  to  the  authorities,  averring  that  he  has 
strangled  his  wife  and  thrown  her  into  the  lake. 
He  puts  his  case  into  the  hands  of  his  lawyer-friend 
Luciano  Spina,  ignorant,  of  course,  of  the  fact  that 
Spina  is  the  seducer  of  his  wife.  Paolo  is  acquitted 
and  returns  to  his  home.  Lo,  the  body  of  a  woman 
is  found  in  the  lake;  he  must  pretend  to  identify  it 
as  his  wife  and  go  through  the  funeral  rites.  And 
now  appears  a  veiled  woman,  returning  from  her 
concealment  in  London,  to  congratulate  her  husband 
upon    his    acquittal.      They   arrange   a   clandestine 


180       THE  DRAMA  OF  TRANSITION 

meeting  within  a  few  paces  of  the  corpse.  The 
next  morning  a  series  of  contretemps  brings  Savina 
face  to  face  with  Luciano  instead  of  her  husband, 
but  it  appears  that  her  passion  for  him  has  cooled, 
so  that  Paolo  may  really  feel  forgiveness  in  his 
heart.  But  unforeseen  complications  arise.  If  he 
confesses  the  deceit  practiced  upon  the  law,  he 
renders  himself  liable  to  thirty  months'  imprison- 
ment. "What?  When  they  believed  that  I  had 
slain  my  wife,  they  let  me  free.  Now  that  they  dis- 
cover I  didn't  kill  her,  they  imprison  me?"  Flight 
is  the  sole  resource,  and  off  they  fly,  to  the  strains  of 
the  funeral  march  being  played  for  the  other  woman. 
The  corpse  is  a  symbol  of  the  erring  wife's  dead 
self;  the  new  Savina  "is  present  smiling  at  her  own 
funeral,  leaning  on  her  husband's  arm." 

Even  d'Amico,  who  sees  in  this  play  the  one  valid 
product  of  the  whole  movement,  finds  it  rather  con- 
ventional in  dialogue  and  not  really  "grotesque"  in 
substance.  "It  is  only  a  happy  ironic  inventioji; 
and  ...  a  colorful  satire  upon  the  contempo- 
rarv  powerlessness  to  live,  treated  in  large,  certain 
lines,  which  really  revive  the  fine  comic  effects,  the 
savory  scenic  strokes  and  the  caricaturesque  de- 
formations ...  of  the  good  old  times,  the  pos- 
sibility of  which  has  been  forgotten  for  years." 
The  play  was  a  great  success  and  went  into  the  Italian 
repertory. 

Taking  the  grotesque  movement  in  its  widest 
application,  we  find  the  figure  of  Luigi  Pirandello 
easily  the  most  interesting,  the  most  pregnant  in 
suggestion,  the  most  successful  in  practice.  Foreign 
critics  will  insist  upon  his  lack  of  modernity,  native 


ITALY  181 

critics  will  point  out  his  essentially  Sicilian  make-up, 
but  the  student  who  approaches  him  undefiled  by 
preconceptions  finds  in  him  a  peculiarly  sympathetic 
personage,  easily  understandable  upon  the  basis  of 
our  common  humanity.  If  Pirandello  is  a  "gro- 
tesquer,"  then  the  school  is  as  old  as  his  literary 
career;  if  he  is  not — and  these  labels  matter  little — 
he  has  added  to  the  Italian  repertory  a  unique 
series  of  plays,  of  uneven  worth,  but  of  undoubted 
originality  and  not  without  their  own  suggestive- 
ness  to  the  sensitive  contemporary  in  quest  of 
deeper  and  wider  spiritual  realms. 

Pirandello  was  born  on  June  28,  1867,  at  Gir- 
genti,  Sicily.  After  a  thorough  education  in  Italy 
he  went  to  the  University  of  Bonn,  where  he  was 
graduated  in  philosophy  and  philology.  His  sub- 
sequent career  has  been  devoted  to  professorship, 
but  has  permitted  him  enough  leisure  in  which  to 
produce  a  veritable  library  of  books,  covering  a  wide 
range  and  revealing  a  fine  quality.  From  poetry 
he  progressed  to  the  novel,  to  criticism,  to  the 
theatre.  His  novel,  //  Fu  Mattia  Pascal  (1904), 
which  has  been  translated  into  French  and  Ger- 
man, is  one  of  the  most  original  Italian  books  of  the 
twentieth  century,  and  was  responsible  for  his  step- 
ping across  the  national  frontier.  It  is  written  in  a 
witty,  fluent,  Boccaccesque  style,  in  which  the 
author  displays  his  characteristic  capability  of  treat- 
ing humorously  situations  of  underlying  seriousness. 
If  Chiarelli's  La  Maschera  e  il  Volto  demonstrates, 
in  d'Amico's  words,  the  modern  "powerlessness  to 
live,"  what  shall  we  say  of  The  Late  Mattia  Pascal^ 
who  dies  more  than  once  in  the  course  of  the  strange 
narrative?    In  his  fiction,  Pirandello  has  been  called 


182        THE  DRAMA  OF  TRANSITION 

a  "gay  pessimist" — a  sobricjuct  that  seems  to  match 
his  paradoxical  style  with  a  corresjX)ncling  paradox; 
his  pessimism,  however,  is  fouiul  not  to  he  the 
Anglo-Saxon  tyjie,  for  umlerncath  it  seems  to  How 
a  current  of  faith.  The  man's  writings  are  really 
topsy-turvy,  compounded  of  cynicism  jostling  against 
sentimentality,  Christian  self-abnegation  rubbing  el- 
bows with  anarchic  ilenial.  He  is  an  "intellectual." 
One  suspects  in  him  the  man  whose  emotions  and 
intellect  have  never  reached  a  state  of  stable  equi- 
librium; now  one,  now  the  other  is  uppermost,  with 
a  resultant  kaleidoscope  of  many-colored  notions, 
ideas,  feelings,  reactions.  He  has  been  credited  with 
having  bn)ught  to  the  stage  his  own  peculiar  hu- 
mor, upon  which,  by  the  way,  he  has  written  a 
tightly  packed  volume.  Like  most  of  the  leading 
Italian  men  of  letters,  he  writes  too  much.  His 
best,  however,  is  so  plainly  expressive  of  a  decidedly 
arresting  personality  that  it  will  remain  as  one  of 
the  traits  of  contemporary  Italian  belles-lettres. 
And  though  it  is  foolish  to  hazard  prophecies,  I  am 
quite  sure  that  his  countrymen  will  remember  him 
as  much  for  his  plays  as  for  his  fiction,  though  it 
is  held  by  a  number  that  his  plays  are  the  lesser 
aspect  of  his  fecund  talents. 

Such  an  early  play  as  Lumie  di  Sicilia  {Siciliah 
Limes)  is  the  farthest  remove  from  the  later  Piran- 
dello. It  is  a  sweet  little  one-act  trifle  in  which  a 
rustic  youth  whose  sacrifice  has  enabled  his  sweet- 
heart to  develop  into  a  world-famous  prima  donna, 
comes  to  meet  her  years  after  their  childhood  davs. 
The  gulf  between  them  yawns  despairingly  great;  he 
is  the  simple  countryman  still,  she  the  spoiled  beauty 
of  a  hundred  capitals.     The  great  singer,  educated 


ITALY  183 

at  the  expense  of  her  provincial  lover,  has  achieved 
her  fame  at  the  cost  of  her  better  self,  while  the 
lover,  outwardly  a  boor,  is  inwardly  the  artist  he 
had  hoped  she  would  become.  At  the  end  Sina  dis- 
tributes to  her  assembled  guests  the  Sicilian  limes 
that  her  lover  had  brought  for  her;  even  so  prodigal 
has  she  been  with  her  own  transplanted  gifts.  Ten- 
der sentimentality,  then,  but  simple  and  affecting; 
more's  the  pity  that  in  a  recent  revision  of  the  play 
Pirandello  saw  fit  to  spoil  it  all  by  having  Sina  burst 
into  a  momentary  fit  of  remorse  while  the  rustic 
leaves  her  implacably. 

It  would  be  bootless  to  take  up  the  entire  Pir- 
andellian  output.  Certain  of  the  larger  plays  stand 
out  for  novelty  of  presentation  or  ingenuity  of  con- 
struction, and  it  is  these  one  should  know  for  a 
proper  appreciation  of  their  author's  relation  to 
the  Italian  drama. 

We  may,  then,  pass  over  with  scant  attention, 
such  productions  as  Pensaci^  GiacominOy  II  Giiioco 
delle  Partly  Ma  non  I  una  cosa  seria^  and  even  the 
recent  Come  prima  meglio  di  prima  and  Tiitto  per 
Bene.  The  first.  Just  Think^  GiacominOy  is  a  queer 
mingling  of  farce,  comedy,  and  melodrama,  illus- 
trative of  Pirandello's  pitying  attitude  toward  the 
creatures  of  life  who  are  plunged  by  circumstances 
into  ridiculous  ventures.  There  is  plenty  of  indig- 
nation against  conventional  morality,  but  it  comes 
from  a  figure  who  is  not  so  much  a  character  as  a 
stilted  principle  in  action.  The  fillip  of  the  play 
derives  its  force  from  the  situation  of  an  elderly 
professor  who,  having  married  a  very  young  girl 
in  order  to  wreak  vengeance  upon  the  government, 
which  will  have  to  pay  her  his  pension  for  many  a 


184        THE  DRAMA  OF  TRANSITION 

year,  acts  as  intermediary  between  her  and  her 
lover.  So,  too.  The  Chess  Game  is  a  drama  of  situa- 
tion in  which  the  supposedly  meek  husband  sends 
his  wife's  lover  to  the  duel  brought  about  by  the 
wife's  machinations,  thus  turning  the  tables.  It's 
Nothi)ig  Serious  depicts  the  fortunes  of  an  amorous 
blade  who  weds  a  homely  boarding-house  girl  in 
self-protection,  finally  falling  in  love  with  her  as  she 
shows  her  true  mettle  and  improves  in  looks  as  a 
result  of  the  care  and  air  she  never  knew  before. 
(A  sort  of  inversion  of  the  theme  treated  by  Sab- 
atino  Lopez  in  //  Brutto  e  le  Belle.)  Like  The  Chess 
Game,  this  is  a  comedy  oi  intellectual  rather  than 
external  situation,  yet  quite  devoid  of  more  than 
passing  humor  or  characterization.  One  may  not 
question  the  human  significance  of  the  puppets, 
but  they  lack  dramatic  existence.  Pirandello,  in- 
tellectual that  he  is,  finds  greater  interest  in  themes 
than  in  persons;  if  his  theatre  is  largely  a  play  of 
marionettes — as  is,  for  that  matter,  the  theatre  of 
the  "grotesquers" — it  is  because  philosophical  pre- 
occupation in  all  artistic  forms  tends  to  reduce 
human  beings  to  symbols  of  thought.  It  is  the  rare 
artist  who  vivifies  the  symbol  that  is  every  human 
being. 

The  better  Pirandello  is  discoverable  in  such  strik- 
ing, ingenious  tours  de  force  as  Cosl  ^,  se  vi  pare 
{It's  So,  If  You  Think  It  Is),  his  very  recent  Sei 
personaggi  in  cerca  d'autore  (Six  Characters  In  ^uest 
of  a  Playwright),  and  the  social  drama  Se  non  cos\ 
{If  Not  Thus),  lately  re-entitled  La  ragione  degli 
altri. 

Se  non  cosl  seems  to  show  the  influence  of  Bracco's 
feministic  plays  and  is  interesting  as  tract,  if  nothing 


ITALY  185 

else.  But  Pirandello  is  always  seeking  the  novel 
point  of  view.  His  treatment  of  the  eternal  tri- 
angle, whatever  else  it  may  lack,  does  manage  in 
the  numerous  plays  he  has  dedicated  to  it,  to  get 
out  of  the  beaten  path.  The  play  turns  upon  the 
desire  of  Leonardo's  wife  to  have  a  child,  even  if  it 
be  the  daughter  of  her  husband  by  his  mistress, 
Elena.  And  in  the  end  her  plea  for  this  species  of 
vicarious  motherhood  is  granted  by  both  the  will- 
ing husband  and  the  reluctant  Elena.  Admitting 
the  plausibility  of  the  wife's  views,  the  play  is  really 
strong  and  moving.  There  is  little  drama  in  the 
text-book  sense  of  the  word,  despite  some  striking 
scenes  in  the  second  and  third  acts,  for  the  "action" 
consists  chiefly  in  the  working  out  of  Livia's  views 
and  the  dialogue  that  arises  from  the  exposition  of 
them.  In  an  interesting,  somewhat  Shavian  Letter 
to  the  Female  Protagonist  of  the  Play,  Pirandello 
explains  his  purpose  in  the  guise  of  a  note,  telling 
the  leading  character  what  an  unattractive  part 
she  has,  and  how  difficult  it  will  be  for  her  to  find 
a  leading  lady  to  essay  the  role. 

It's  SOy  If  You  Think  It  Is  is  one  of  the  pivotal 
plays  of  the  Pirandellian  canon.  At  the  center  of 
the  author's  method  lies  a  philosophical  conception 
of  man  as  a  complex  of  many  selves  and  of  reality 
as  a  tissue  of  countless  illusions.  Unity  in  thought 
or  action  thus  becomes  but  another  illusion,  and  the 
true  reality  is  whatever  we  happen  to  think  at  the 
moment.  "It's  so,  if  you  think  it  is,"  and,  as  the 
author  might  have  added,  "You  are,  if  you  think 
you  are."  The  plot,  called  a  "parable,"  moves  with 
a  swiftness  necessary  to  such  a  conception;  it  be- 
comes bewildering,  and,  indeed,  if  it  is  to  delight  an 


186       THE  DR.^MA  OF  TR^^NSITION 

audience,  must  not  permit  them  to  linger  too  long 
over  the  palpable  absurdities  of  the  intellectual 
farce — for  such  it  is.  This  is  not,  like  the  greatest 
art,  an  unfokiing  of  beautihil  experience.  It  is  an 
anarchistic  philosophical  essay  written  in  people  in- 
stead of  words.  But  the  inescapable  truth  is  that 
it  has  delighted  cultured  audiences  who  do  not  hes- 
itate to  choose  between  conformity  to  formula  and 
actuality  of  impression. 

'I'he  new  secretary  to  the  prefect  of  an  Italian 
town  comes  with  his  wife  and  his  mother-in-law. 
Queerly  enough,  his  wife  is  kept  isolated  by  him, 
and  his  mother-in-law  can  go  to  see  her  daughter 
only  in  the  courtyard,  never  entering  the  home. 
This  arouses  the  curiosity  of  the  Agazzi  family, 
whose  head  is  the  commissioner  of  the  town  and 
whose  wife  and  daughter  are  among  the  leading  so- 
ciety gossips  of  the  place.  All  the  more  so  since  the 
mother-in-law,  Signora  I'Vola,  lives  in  the  same  build- 
ing as  they.  Ponza  explains  that  the  mother-in-law 
is  demented;  that  his  wife  is  not  really  her  daughter 
(who  died  four  years  ago),  but  another,  whom  she 
has  taken  it  into  her  head  is  her  daughter  Lina,  his 
first  wife.  She,  on  the  other  hand,  tells  a  different 
story,  saying  that  her  son-in-law  so  ruined  the 
health  of  her  daughter  by  excessive  love  at  their 
marriage  that  she  had  to  be  placed  in  a  sanitarium, 
and  that  he  became  obsessed  with  the  idea  that 
she  had  died,  and  that  seeing  her  again,  he  imagined 
it  a  new  love  affair,  and  a  second  ceremony  was 
gone  through  to  humor  him.  At  the  same  time 
Signora  Frola  humored  him  in  his  ideas  as  to  her 
(Frola's)  demented  condition.  Gossip  asks  which 
of  the  two  is  the  crazy  one.    Sides  are  taken.    Lam- 


ITALY  187 

berto  Laudisi,  brother-in-law  of  Councillor  Agazzi, 
is  the  raisonneur  of  the  play, — a  sort  of  philosoph- 
ical gracioso  type,  who  ridicules  both  sides  and  so 
confuses  them  with  added  hypotheses  that  he  makes 
them  fear  that  he'll  get  them  all  crazy  before  the 
matter  is  cleared  up.  Finally  it  is  suggested  that  if 
Frola  and  her  son-in-law  are  brought  together  in 
Agazzi's,  the  truth  must  come  out.  In  an  excellent 
scene-a-faire  this  is  done  (act  two),  but  leaves  more 
doubt  than  ever!  At  last  Laudisi,  maliciously,  no 
doubt,  hits  upon  the  idea  of  asking  the  wife  the 
true  state  of  affairs.  (They  have  been  in  an  earth- 
quake and  all  documents  of  the  town  they  came 
from  have  been  destroyed,  while  affidavits  from 
residents  of  that  place  are  hazy  and  merely  add  con- 
fusion and  perplexity.)  The  wife  comes  and  says 
that  she  is  both  the  daughter  of  Signora  Frola  and 
the  second  wife  of  Ponza.  Whereupon  Laudisi 
triumphantly  bursts  out  laughing. 

Signora  Ponza:  What?  The  truth;  it's  simply  this: 
that  I  am  the  daughter  of  Signora  Frola,  and  also  the 
second  wife  of  Signer  Ponza;  yes,  and  to  myself,  neither, 
neither! 

The  Prefect:  Ah,  no,  to  yourself,  madam,  you  must 
be  one  or  the  other! 

Signora  Ponza:  No,  sir.  To  myself  I  am  that  which 
I  am  believed  to  be! 

Laudisi:  Behold,  gentlemen,  how  speaks  Truth!  Are 
you  satisfied?    Ha,  ha,  ha! 

In  the  second  act  there  is  an  interesting,  original, 
and  illuminative  soliloquy  of  Laudisi's  with  his  image 
in  the  mirror: 

"Well,  my  dear  chap?  Which  is  the  madman  of 
us  two?    Oh,  I  know.     I  say  You.    And  you  say  I. 


188        THE  DRAMA  OF  TRANSITION 

You,  you!  And  again,  I.  .  .  .  There,  there; 
face  to  face  with  each  other  we  know  each  other 
well!  The  trouble  is  that  others  don't  see  you  as  I 
do!  And  in  that  case,  my  dear  boy,  what  becomes 
of  you?  I  say  to  myself  that  here,  in  front  of  you, 
I  see  myself  and  touch  myself — you,  as  soon  as 
you're  seen  by  others,  what  do  you  become?  A 
fantasm,  dear  chap,  a  fantasm!  Well,  do  you  see 
these  mad  folk?  Without  paying  any  attention  to 
the  fantasms  they  carry  with  themselves,  in  them- 
selves, they  nm  about,  tilled  with  curiosity,  in  chase 
of  others'  fantasms!  And  they  imagine  it's  a  dif- 
ferent matter.     .     . 

A  philosophical  piece,  then,  in  which  the  author 
displays  toward  the  reader  the  same  malicious, 
taunting  attitude  that  Laudisi  shows  toward  the 
other  spectators.  As  the  author  says,  it  is  a  parable; 
plainly,  then,  he  meant  to  inculcate  the  lesson  that 
truth  is  much  a  matter  of  seeming,  and  that  there 
may  be  more  than  one  truth — as  many,  in  fact,  as 
there  are  persons  and  even  circumstances.  And 
when  at  last  we  think  we  discover  the  tRith  fSig- 
nora  Ponza)  she  gives  us  a  Delphic  reply.  Is  there 
truth?  Is  truth  a  Delphic  oracle?  And  what  a 
strange,  silly  sight  we  present  chasing  after  it  with 
more  ot  the  inquisitive  gossip  in  us  than  of  the 
serious  searcher  after  any  real  good!  And  how  for- 
getful of  our  own  similar  position  in  our  inquiries 
after  the  strange  aspect  of  others!  Laudisi  sums  it 
up  in  his  talk  to  himself  before  the  mirror.  For 
isn't  the  whole  world  a  mirror,  and  aren't  we  con- 
tinuously puzzled  with  our  own  reflections — whether 
they  occur  in  mirrors  or  in  the  hearts,  souls,  and 
actions  of  others? 


ITALY  189 

The  end,  as  in  so  many  of  Pirandello's  plays,  is 
somewhat  weak.  Need  it  be  pointed  out  that  the 
piece  is  in  Pirandello's  characteristic,  dualistic  mood 
of  sober  humor? 

Later  dramas  like  Tutto  per  Bene  and  Come  prima 
meglio  di  prima  represent  industry  rather  than 
creative  impulse;  Pirandello  must  keep  the  theatres 
supplied  with  fuel,  and  marks  time  with  just  such 
superficial,  conscienceless  trash  as  this.  The  first 
has  all  the  earmarks  of  its  pattern:  "papers,"  du- 
bious paternity,  and  that  hoary  band.  The  second 
is  not  so  much  a  play  of  deep  passion  as  of  hectic 
speech,  in  which  a  woman,  recovering  from  an  at- 
tempt at  suicide,  is  taken  back  by  her  husband  to 
the  household  she  deserted  when  her  child  was 
three  years  old — that  is,  thirteen  years  previous. 
Her  true  status  is  kept  secret  for  the  sake  of  that 
daughter,  who,  coming  upon  the  discovery  that  no 
marriage  certificate  exists  (again  the  "papers!") 
thinks  her  father  unlawfully  in  union  with  this 
woman.  A  new  baby  comes  to  the  mother,  leading 
to  the  revelation  of  the  truth.  Note  Pirandello's 
need  of  dealing  with  personages  compelled  to  appear 
in  a  double  social  role;  his  fondness  for  multiple 
personality.  In  his  worst  and  his  best  alike,  the 
man  is  primarily  a  spectator  of  human  complica- 
tions and  follies,  atracted  more  by  the  intellectual 
problems  inherent  in  them  than  by  the  passions 
engendered. 

Six  Characters  in  ^uest  of  a  Playwright  redeems 
him  from  such  pot-boilers  as  these.  Produced  this 
year  at  Rome  with  signal  success,  and  shortly  after- 
ward acted  in  London  with  flattering  outcome,  it 
is  in  the  vein  of  Cost  e,  se  vi  pare.     By  a  natural 


190        THE  DRAMA  OF  TRANSITION 

process  of  his  restless,  introspective,  curious  mind, 
he  turns  up<jn  himself  with  quasi-Shavian  satire 
against  the  playwright  and  with  comic  situations 
arising  trom  the  strange  rehearsal  into  which  the 
players  of  the  piece  are  torced.  Here  is  a  drama- 
tist's holiday,  and  a  critic's  as  well.  He  jx)kes  fun 
at  himself,  converses  with  himself  al)f)ut  the  prob- 
lems of  the  drama  in  general,  anil  finally  solves 
the  difficulty  with  a  bullet  shot  that  solves  nothing 
at  all.  The  old  plight  of  Pirandello— and  how  many 
countless  others! — the  hastened,  arbitrary  ending, 
so  as  to  have  done  with  it  all  and  ring  down  the 
curtain. 

Perhaps  it  is  one's  hope  that  seems  to  detect  in 
this  play  a  sign  of  Pirandello's  coming  abandonment 
of  the  old-fashioned  eternal  triangle,  to  which  he  has 
tried  to  give  a  new  twist,  yet  which  burdens  his 
production  unduly.  I  would  not  be  understood  as 
opposing  the  "triangle"  here  on  moral  grounds,  nor 
would  1  agree  with  Dr.  Lander  MacClintock  in  his 
valuable  The  Contemporary  I}rama  of  Italy  (page  258) 
that  the  triangle  "is  a  fashion,  a  literary  convention, 
and  not  a  record  of  a  social  condition  in  Italy  or  any 
other  country."  Our  institution  of  marriage  is 
breaking  up;  the  triangle,  among  other  things,  is  a 
symbol  of  human  chafing  in  social  bonds;  it  always 
existed,  and  whatever  the  form  that  eventually 
supplants  marriage  as  we  know  it,  will  always  exist 
as  a  token  of  man's  (and  woman's)  rebellion  against 
enforced  monogamy.  (The  important  word  here  is, 
not  monogamy,  but  enforced.)  To  return  to 
Pirandello,  I  merely  mean  that  he  is  too  much  pre- 
occupied with  it — a  question  of  proportion,  not  a 
concession   to  Mrs.   Grundy.     Certainly  enough   it 


ITALY  191 

looks  as  if  he  had  started  out  this  time  to  write  some- 
thing quite  as  bad  as  the  two  dramas  that  went  before 
and  was  seized,  in  the  middle  oi  the  task,  with  mis- 
givings and  with  a  spirit  of  harsh  self-criticism. 
Having  entangled  himself  in  a  snarl  of  marital  and 
extra-marital  difficulties,  and  finding  himself  hard 
put  to  it  to  extricate  not  only  characters  but  him- 
self, he  seems  to  have  turned  about  face  and  aimed 
the  question  at  the  audience.  In  other  words, 
though  the  teasing  title  is  Six  Characters  in  ^uest  of 
a  Playwright^  the  reality  is  a  playwright  in  quest 
of  what  to  do  with  his  six  characters.  And  what  has 
he  done  but  bring  them  upon  the  "boards"  and  let 
them  argue  out  their  own  case  before  the  public? 
It  is  as  if  the  stage  has  become  the  teeming  brain 
of  Professor  Pirandello,  and  the  audience,  by  some 
strange  psychic  license,  has  been  permitted  to  look 
right  into  the  throbbing  mechanism  of  a  dramatist's 
mind  at  work.  This  sounds  something  like  the 
monodrama  as  written  and  produced  by  the  queer 
Russian  Evreinov,  and,  to  be  sure,  there  is  not  a 
little  similarity  between  the  manner  in  which  the 
Italian  treats  his  problem  and  that  in  which  Evrei- 
nov has  presented  it  in  his  one-act  Theatre  of  the 
Soul.  But  where  Evreinov  makes  no  break  between 
the  representation  of  the  soul's  unconscious  and 
outer  reality,  Pirandello  is  compelled  to  differen- 
tiate between  his  inchoate  characters  of  the  play 
that  is  yet  to  be  written  and  the  flesh-and-blood 
actors  and  stage  director  to  whom  they  come  in 
their  eagerness  to  be  made  into  a  drama. 

The  play,  nominally,  is  continuous,  but  the  dram- 
atist manages  to  introduce  two  logical  waits,  during 
one  of  which  the  curtain  actually  is  lowered  by  a 


192        THE  DRAMA  OF  TRAXSITIOX 

supposed  error  of  the  stage  hands.  Thus  there  is 
preserved  a  strict  unity  of  tinie,  place,  and  action — 
more  rigid,  indeed,  than  that  called  for  by  a  much 
misinterpreted  Greek  gentleman  named  Aristotle. 
It  must  have  amused  Pirandello  that  he  was  able 
literally  to  have  unity  in  variety  by  lowering  partial 
"sets"  upon  the  stage,  thus  achieving  the  effect  of 
a  change  of  place  without  moving  from  the  spot,  as 
it  were.  And  this,  perhaps,  was  the  least  of  his 
pleasures,  for  the  structvirc  of  his  play  affords  him 
opportunity  to  play  with  the  new  lighting,  to  in- 
dulge in  the  philosophical  chatter  that  he  so  dearly 
loves,  and  to  disport  himscH  with  the  paradoxes  to 
which  his  very  conception  perforce  gives  rise. 

As  the  audience  enters  it  discovers  a  stage  with 
curtain  raised  and  no  scene  set.  It  is  for  all  the 
world  as  if  one  had  come  in  just  before  a  private 
rehearsal  and  discovered  the  theatre  in  its  work-day 
clothes.  And,  indeed,  a  rehearsal  is  about  to  take 
place — that  of  a  "play  by  Pirandello  entitled  // 
Giuoco  delle  Parti.  {The  Chess  Game,  one  of  the 
earlier  dramas,  essentially  of  situation,  in  which  the 
emphasis  is  shitted  to  psychological  rather  than  ex- 
ternal clashes,  and  in  which  the  clever  husband  man- 
ages to  turn  the  tables  upon  his  wife  and  her  lover. 
Though  there  is  an  evident  desire  to  impart  new 
thrills  to  the  old,  old,  eternal  triangle,  there  is  little 
characterization,  the  humor  is  acrid,  and  at  times 
even  grim,  while  the  action  is  hardly  compelling.) 
The  rehearsal  begins  and  the  director  is  soon  argu- 
ing with  his  actors  about  the  merits  of  the  play. 
Of  course  it's  ridiculous,  he  answers,  "but  what 
can  I  do  about  it  if  no  more  good  plays  come  to  us 
from  France  and  we  are  reduced  to  staging  plays  bv 


ITALY  193 

Pirandello — plays  in  which  you  can't  understand  a 
thing,  written  purposely  by  the  author  so  as  to 
make  fun  of  me,  of  you,  and  of  the  public?" 

No  sooner  have  they  resumed  work  than  the 
doorman  comes  upon  the  stage  announcing  to  the 
director  the  intrusion  of  a  strange  sextet  who  insist 
upon  seeing  him.  (It  is  to  be  noted  that  the  stage 
directions  call  for  a  certain  halo  of  light  to  surround 
the  strangers,  as  a  suggestion  of  their  "fantastic 
reality."  As  they  advance  to  converse  with  the 
actors  the  light  disappears,  yet  they  are  to  preserve 
during  the  entire  action  a  suggestion  of  their  dream- 
quality.)  These  six  persons  are  the  cast  of  the 
drama  that  Pirandello  did  not  write.  They  have 
come  to  the  stage  director  with  their  tale  of  woe, 
that  he  may  write  them  up  in  a  play  and  thus  en- 
dow them  with  that  dramatic  existence  which  they 
crave.  Of  course  they  are  received  with  quizzical 
anger,  which  soon  subsides  into  amused  curiosity. 

Their  tale,  as  it  is  slowly  extracted  from  them,  is 
strange  enough.  The  father,  upon  the  birth  of  his 
first  son,  sent  him  off  to  be  nursed  in  the  country, 
where  he  might  grow  up  morally  and  physically 
sound.  A  rival,  at  first  unwitting,  has  appeared 
upon  the  scene  in  the  shape  of  his  secretary;  at  last 
things  come  to  a  pass  where  the  husband,  in  all  good 
humor,  sends  his  wife  off  to  the  other  man,  together 
with  whom  she  raises  a  family.  The  father,  as  men 
will  do,  lives  a  rather  careless  life  until  one  day  he 
comes  upon  his  own  stepdaughter  in  a  brothel  and 
learns  the  horrible  truth.  The  poor  mother  imagines 
that  she  is  earning  her  living  at  Madame  Pace's  as 
a  seamstress;  in  reality  Madame  Pace  employs 
the  mother  only  as  a  blind  to  the  real  purposes  for 


194       THE  DRAMA  OF  TRANSITION 

which  she  uses  the  stepdaughter.  Here,  then,  are 
two  separate  families  held  loosely  together  by  the 
sorrowful  figure  of  the  mother.  There  are  other 
complications  that  need  not  detain  us;  it  is  impor- 
tant only  to  indicate  the  surly  reticence  of  the 
grown-up  son,  who  has  steadily  objected  to  drag- 
ging this  domestic  imbroglio  on  to  the  stage,  and 
the  quiet  youth  whose  suicide  ends  both  their  tale 
and  the  play  as  presented  by  Pirandello. 

The  stage  director  is  interested;  so  much  so  that 
he  would  at  once  set  about  arranging  the  play,  dis- 
tributing the  parts  and  rehearsing  the  salient  scenes. 
The  actors  are  astonished  at  their  director's  resolu- 
tion. "Is  he  really  in  earnest?"  asks  the  leading 
man.  "This  is  sheer  madness!"  exclaims  the  jeune 
premiere.  And  a  third:  ".Are  they  going  to  have  us 
improvise  a  drama  here,  just  as  we  stand?"  .  .  . 
"Like  the  actors  of  the  Commedia  dell'  Arte!" 
snarls  the  jeune  premier. 

Leadin'G  Lady':  Docs  he  imagine  I'm  going  to  lend 
myself  to  jokes  of  this  sort! 

Jeune    Premiere:     Me,  neither! 

A  Fourth  Actor:  I'd  like  to  know  who  those  people 
are  {referring  to  the  six  persons). 

The  Third  Actor:  Who  do  you  think?  Lunatics 
and  meddlers! 

Jeune  Premiere:    And  does  he  listen  to  what  they  say? 

Jeune  Premier:  Vanity,  that's  what  it  is.  The  van- 
ity of  figuring  as  an  author. 

First  Actor:  Who  ever  heard  the  like!  If  the  stage, 
my  dear  people,  is  to  sink  as  low  as  this    .    .    . 

A  Fifth  Actor:    I  find  this  extremely  funny! 

Third  Actor:  Bah!  \\Tiat's  the  odds?  Let's  sec 
what  comes  of  it! 


ITALY  195 

As  the  actors  leave  the  stage  the  curtain  remains 
up.  The  play  is  interrupted  for  about  twenty  min- 
utes. There  is  something  more  than  mere  novelty 
in  thus  leaving  the  curtain  up.  The  director  has 
retired  with  the  six  persons,  so  that  they  may  ar- 
range some  sort  of  scenario  to  follow  in  building  up 
the  play.  By  allowing  the  stage  to  remain  visible 
during  the  interval,  the  audience  is  in  a  sense  made 
a  participant  in  the  wait  of  the  actors.  The  time 
during  which  the  stage  is  left  empty  is  precisely  the 
time  that  passes  between  what  we  may  call  the  first 
act  and  the  second. 

The  attempt  to  enact  in  rehearsal  the  scenario 
that  has  been  tentatively  agreed  upon  affords  the 
opportunity  for  such  effects  as  have  now  grown 
quite  old  in  the  service  of  rehearsal  scenes.  The 
whole  story  has  not  yet  come  out,  and  as  the  trial 
scenes  are  gone  over,  new  details  keep  cropping  up, 
sounding  like  one  thing  as  spoken  by  the  persons 
who  have  lived  them,  and  like  quite  another  as 
enacted  by  the  artists  to  whom  the  parts  have  been 
entrusted.  Whence  arises  cause  for  speculation  upon 
the  true  nature  of  reahty,  upon  the  function  of  fact 
upon  the  stage  as  opposed  to  the  higher  reality  of 
art,  and  sundry  other  considerations  that  fail  but 
rarely  to  occupy  the  Pirandellian  mind.  Enthusiastic 
over  a  culminating  scene,  the  director  cries  "Cur- 
tain!" to  signify  that  the  scene  may  stand  exactly 
as  acted,  with  the  climax  at  that  particular  point. 
The  machinist,  mistaking  the  director's  outcry,  ac- 
tually lowers  the  curtain,  leaving  the  director  and 
the  father  before  the  footlights.  They  make  their 
way  behind  the  scenes  with  the  director  loud  in  his 
praises  of  the  first  act  that  they  have  just  impro- 


196        THK  DRAMA  OI     I  RANSITION 

vised  and  rehearsed.  Now  comes  the  rehearsal  of 
the  second,  in  which  the  trials  and  outcome  are 
much  like  what  has  preceded,  except  that  the  youth 
of  the  tale  takes  it  into  his  head  to  end  his  life,  thus 
terminating  the  drama. 

What  Pirandello  has  done,  then,  is  to  present  his 
drama  without  presenting  it.  Me  has  shown  us  the 
characters,  told  their  tale  through  their  own  mouths, 
and  allowed  them  to  argue  the  matter  out  before 
his  audience.  He  has,  moreover,  had  them  argue 
the  matter  out  with  the  very  actors  to  whom  their 
parts  would  be  entrusted.  .And  all  the  time,  of 
course,  he  has  been  discussing  the  matter  with  him- 
self. In  all  conscience,  then,  this  is,  as  the  sub- 
title has  it,  a  "play  yet  to  be  written,"  Not  a  play, 
thus,  in  the  conventional  sense,  yet  surely  a  spec- 
tacle upon  the  stage,  and  one  that  affords  intel- 
lectual delight.  It  is  in  no  way,  however,  a  prac- 
tical demonstration  of  dramaturgy;  the  foundations 
are  psychological.  "The  drama  dwells  in  us,"  says 
the  father  when  he  Hrst  comes  upon  the  stage. 
"And  we  are  impatient  to  perform  it  just  as  our 
inner  passion  urges  us."  The  end  suggests  the  half- 
mocking  close  of  the  author's  best  piece,  Cosl  k,  se 
vi  pare.  "He's  truly  dead!"  cry  several  of  the 
actors  after  the  cli.mactic  shot  has  been  fired.  "No!" 
cry  several  others.  "It's  all  a  make-believe!  Just 
make-believe!"  Whereupon  the  father  utters  a 
piercing  shriek:  "Who  said  make-believe?  Reality, 
gentlemen.  Reality!"  And  at  last  the  director: 
"Make-believe!  Reality!  To  the  devil  with  the 
whole  bunch  of  you!  The  like  of  this  never  hap- 
pened to  me  before!  .And  here's  a  whole  dav  gone 
to  waste!" 


ITALY  197 

The  self-critical  implications  of  the  play  are  quite 
true  to  the  Pirandellian  method,  as  is  the  dialogue 
and  the  speculation  of  the  characters.  So  that  when 
the  author  brings  himself  and  his  players  upon  the 
scene  he  is  but  faithful  to  his  personal  methods  as 
already  shown  in  the  best  of  his  previous  work.  It 
would  then  be  short-sighted  to  attribute  all  of  the 
novelty  in  the  newest  play  to  such  possible  insti- 
gators as  Shaw's  Fanny  s  First  Play.  That  Shaw 
has  influenced  Pirandello  more  or  less  superficially 
there  can  be  little  doubt;  yet  as  Marco  Praga  has 
remarked,  Pirandello  may  be  an  Italian  Shaw,  but 
he  is  a  very  Italian  one.  So  Italian,  in  fact,  that  few 
of  his  plays,  in  all  likelihood,  will  ever  be  received 
outside  of  the  peninsular  boundaries,  unless  by  that 
small  audience  in  every  land  which  realizes  the 
really  superficial  traits  separating  one  people  from 
another,  and  is  willing  to  abandon  the  narrowly 
national  mood  for  that  larger  one  connoted  by  valid 
cosmopolitanism. 

"Do  you  know  what  I  think.''"  asks  the  director 
during  one  of  the  many  trying  moments  of  the  re- 
hearsal added  to  a  rehearsal.  "That  you  people" 
(this  to  the  unrealized  personages)  "are  trying  to 
adopt  the  manner  of  a  certain  author  for  whom  I 
feel  a  particular  detestation.  ...  In  fact,  I  was 
just  rehearsing  one  of  his  pieces  when  you  came 
in.  .  .  .  And  here's  a  fine  exchange  we've  made. 
From  the  frying-pan  into  the  fire!"  The  change 
from  //  Giuoco  delle  Parti  to  Sei  personaggi  in  cerca 
d'autore^  however,  is  surely  no  falling  from  the  frying- 
pan  into  the  flames.  The  first  is  Pirandello  almost 
at  his  worst;  the  second,  Pirandello  pretty  near  his 
best. 


198       THE  DRAMA  OF  TRANSITION 

Plays  continue  to  flow  from  his  pen  with  aston- 
ishing ease,  perhaps  because  they  are  chiefly  the 
product  of  thought  rather  than  experience,  and  aim 
at  elucidation  rather  than  illumination  of  vital 
passion.  The  newest,  Enrico  IT,  follows  the  mood 
and  manner  of  Cosl  ^,  se  vi  pare  and  Sei  personaggi 
in  cerca  d'autore.  A  Roman  gentleman  on  his  way 
to  a  masked  ball  in  the  guise  o\  Henry  I\'  of  olden 
Germany,  meets  with  an  accident  that  makes  him 
really  believe  he  is  the  ancient  potentate;  later  re- 
covering from  his  madness,  he  finds  it  to  his  ad- 
vantage to  continue  simulating  it;  when,  finally, 
he  confesses  his  deceit,  the  confusion  is  greater  than 
ever.  The  stock  Pirandellian  theme  of  multiple 
personality,  of  illusion's  predominance  over  reality, 
with  the  same  sudden,  arbitrary  way  out  of  it  by 
means  of  a  bullet. 

Pirandello,  easily  one  of  the  most  interesting  and 
entertaining  of  latter-day  dramatists,  is  not  so  easily 
admitted  into  the  ranks  of  the  indispensable  few. 
If,  following  the  rigid  canons  of  Storm  Jameson,  we 
must  have  plays  with  which  to  amuse  the  warrior 
in  his  leisure,  there  they  are.  Like  a  lesser  Shaw, 
Pirandello  ventilates  issues,  shifts  personages  over 
the  chess-board  of  his  fancy,  forms  new  combina- 
tions with  the  colored  glass  of  his  dramaturgic 
kaleidoscope.  Far  less  of  a  dialectician  than  Shaw, 
inferior  to  him  in  a  grasp  of  the  modern  world,  in 
wit  and  contemporaneity,  he  yet  suggests  the  Irish- 
man by  his  very  dilution  of  these  qualities.  What  has 
he  written?  Are  they  plays  at  all?  I  leave  such 
questions  to  the  pedagogues.  Pirandello's  best  pro- 
ductions   are    a   welcome    addition    to    the    modern 


ITALY  199 

stage;  if  no  category  exists  for  them,  why,  someone 
will  have  to  invent  one  for  them,  that  is  all. 

The  activities  of  the  rest  of  the  "grotesquers"  are 
more  fervid  than  important.  A  few  representative 
examples  will  suffice. 

Rosso  di  San  Secondo  first  came  to  Italian  notice 
with  his  Marionette^  Che  Passione!  (literally,  "Puppets, 
What  Passion!"),  in  three  acts  and  a  prelude,  not 
including  the  advice  given  by  the  author  to  the 
actors  in  a  page  of  the  printed  version.  "The  actors 
must  bear  in  mind,"  he  writes,  "that  this  is  a  play 
of  desperate  pauses.  The  words  pronounced  in  it 
always  conceal  an  exasperation  which  cannot  be 
communicated  except  in  sapient  silences.  The  ar- 
bitrariness, moreover,  that  may  appear  in  the  play, 
resulting  from  the  torment  in  which  the  personages 
are  plunged,  should  not  give  way  to  comic  effect, 
but  rather  to  a  feeling  of  tragic  'humorism.'  For, 
suffering  indeed  profoundly  human  pangs,  the  three 
protagonists  of  the  drama  are  like  marionettes,  and 
the  wire  that  pulls  them  is  passion. 

"They  are  all  human  beings:  human  beings  re- 
duced to  puppets. 

"And  therefore,  deeply  pitiful!" 

The  prelude  is  a  quasi  prose-poem,  apostrophiz- 
ing the  "long  Sunday  afternoons,  with  the  deserted 
streets,  the  closed  shops,  and  a  desolate  grey  sky 
over  the  grime  of  the  city!"  It  is  not  part  of  the 
action,  but  seeks  to  do  for  it,  interpretatively,  what 
the  advice  to  the  actors  would  do  histrionically. 
The  action  itself  takes  place  in  Milan,  on  a  Sunday 
afternoon   and  evening.     The  "grotesquers,"   then. 


200       THP.  DRAMA  OF  TRANSITION 

have  not  altogether  abolished  the  unity  of  time; 
since  in  this  respect,  through  this  play,  Rosso  di 
San  Secondo  is  more  Greek  than  the  Greeks.  Such 
reversion  to  antiquity  is  one  of  the  queer  signs  of 
ultra-modernity.  The  characters  have  no  names; 
they  are  such  creatures  as  "The  Woman  in  the 
Blue  Fox,"  "The  Man  in  Grey,"  "The  Gentleman 
in  Mcnirning,"  "The  Singer,"  "He  Who  Should  Not 
Have  Come,"  and  others  less  distinguished  but 
hardly  less  vague.  We  are  introduced  to  a  telegraph 
office,  into  which,  even  on  a  Sunday,  come  rushing 
all  the  phases  of  life  from  birth  to  death,  with  the 
mid-point  of  marriage.  The  "Man  in  Mourning" 
strikes  up  an  acquaintance  with  "The  Woman  in 
the  Blue  Fox;"  each  has  an  unhappy  connubial 
past  and  is  drawn  to  the  other  by  nascent  hopes, 
perhaps  of  a  better  future  in  common.  The  "Man 
in  Grey"  overhears  and  impulsively  urges  them 
against  such  a  course,  "^'et  the  next  act  finds  him 
following  close  upon  "The  Man  in  Mourning,"  into 
the  house  where  the  blue-fox  lady  stays.  1  he  men 
quarrel  over  the  woman,  swayed  this  way  and  that 
by  passion,  and  at  last,  reconciled,  plan  a  party 
with  the  woman  and  her  friend,  "The  Singer." 
They  adjourn  to  a  hotel  for  their  supper  of  recon- 
ciliation, when  who  should  appear  at  the  crucial 
moment  but  Mme.  Blue  Fox's  husband,  who  wins 
his  spouse  away  from  the  disconcerted  diners. 
"The  Man  in  Grey"  takes  poison;  "The  Singer" 
mourns  him,  while  "The  Man  in  Mourning"  turns 
now  to  "The  Singer"  for  consolation.  The  curtain 
descends  upon  the  general  dissatisfaction  of  the  actors 
— and  of  the  audience,  too,  if  the  printed  page 
counts  for  anything. 


ITALY  201 

There  is  evident  attempt  to  bring  to  the  stage 
new  backgrounds,  new  personages.  The  total  effect, 
hov/ever,  is  one  of  hysteria.  The  directions  for  the 
first  act  are  that  it  be  recited  throughout  in  a  low 
voice  punctuated  by  long  pauses.  Not  linked  sweet- 
ness, but  disjointed  gruffness,  long  drawn  out. 
Even  from  this  play  it  is  discernible  that  the  gro- 
tesque theatre  seeks  to  be  largely  a  theatre  of  ideas, 
even  of  abstraction,  reflected  in  a  distorting  mirror. 
Lawyers,  business  men,  and  the  regular  types  are 
yielding  to  psychiatrists  and  that  ilk,  in  both  fiction 
and  the  drama— and  discoverably  in  the  United 
States  as  well  as  in  Italy.  The  ghost — nay,  too  often 
the  corporeal  substance  of  Freud — stalks  through 
the  pages  of  our  native  products.  Glaspell,  O'Neill, 
and,  in  a  humbler  way.  Miss  Gerstenberg,  bear 
testimony  for  the  stage  of  America;  in  Germany, 
Wedekind;  in  Russia,  Evreinov;  in  Italy,  Cav- 
acchioli — the  names  are  juxtaposed  without  any  im- 
plications of  artistic  equality.  We  are  in  the  psycho- 
analytic age  of  letters  and  the  stage  yields  its  share 
of  the  evidence. 

Rosso  di  San  Secondo's  latest  play,  a  recent  one, 
is  called  UOspite  Desiderata  {The  Desired  Guest) — 
a  "tragic  event  in  three  acts."  Here,  too,  is  advice 
for  the  actors,  which  reads  as  follows:  "The  action 
of  the  drama,  though  essentially  human,  is  born  of 
a  nightmare-state  of  the  mind.  Reality  is,  there- 
fore, there  transfigured  into  alarmed  and  varied 
syntheses  such  as  characterize  horrible  dreams. 
The  actors,  therefore,  both  in  voice  and  in  gesture, 
will  convey  throughout  a  suggestion  of  the  som- 
nambulistic and  the  anxious  that  shall  transmit  to 
the  spectator  not  only  the  essential  trait  of  the  per- 


202        THE  DRAMA  OF  TRANSITION 

sonage  represented,  but  the  atmosphere  of  painful 
lyrism  in  which  that  personage  moves."  In  con- 
trast with  the  previous  play,  the  persons  are  only 
five  in  number.  Mclina  uses  her  servant  Adclgisa 
as  a  sort  of  cat's-paw,  attributing  to  the  servant  all 
her  own  feelings  and  desires.  The  same  methods 
she  employs  with  her  husband,  Paridc  Malviti,  al- 
most convincing  him  that  it  was  he,  and  not  she, 
who  desired  as  guest  Stcfano  Hrosia.  The  guest 
himself  is  somewhat  in  the  dark,  but  he  comes. 
Whv  has  he  been  invited?  The  question  rises 
srronij;cr  than  ever  in  the  second  act.  Was  it  that 
Mclina  wished  variety?  Because  her  husband 
needed  him? 

In  any  case,  Mclina  is  a  bare-faced,  cunning  siren, 
who  works  her  will  upon  poor  .Adclgisa  until  the 
servant  rebels,  going  so  f;ir  as  to  offer  herself  to 
Stefano  rather  than  see  him  a  slave  to  the  volup- 
tuous mistress.  At  a  banquet  (Act  Three)  prepared 
bv  Mclina  for  Stefano,  the  latter  pretends,  at  the 
climax  of  the  festivities,  to  hear  his  friend  Malviti's 
groans.  He  goes  off  to  tetch  the  husband  and  sud- 
denly turns  about  face  in  attitude,  declaring  that  he 
will  accept  .Adclgisa's  offer,  and  that  Melina  still 
loves  her  husband.  The  angry  .Melina  dashes  for 
Adelgisa,  but  the  guest  gives  to  the  servant  the 
knife  with  which  she  may  slay  the  mistress.  .And 
now  Stefano  cries  to  the  husband  that  they  are  both 
free  of  the  servant  and  the  mistress  alike;  he  sum- 
mons help  to  catch  the  murderess  m  flagrante  delictu^ 
as  it  were,  and  together  with  the  maltreated  husband 
makes  his  escape. 

Thus  recounted,  in  staccato  form,  the  play  sounds 
worse  than  it  is,  for  the  reader  cannot  deny  it  several 
dramaturgic  qualities  of  a  fairly  high  order.    Grant- 


ITALY  203 

ing  the  special  technique,  the  dialogue  is  at  times 
fine,  as  is  the  peculiar  psychology  and  the  suspense. 
One  does  get  a  real  feeling  of  Melina's  wiles;  her 
words,  their  visible  influence  over  the  characters, 
her  cunning  art  of  so  shifting  her  wishes  that  they 
appear  the  wishes  of  others — these  are  tokens  of  a 
gift  that  seems,  on  the  whole,  somewhat  misem- 
ployed, or  rather,  tentatively  groping.  Grant  the 
sincerity  of  these  new  writers  and  it  is  easy  to  feel 
a  certain  relief  that  they  choose  such  queer  channels 
for  their  art  rather  than  the  deep  ruts  of  older  paths. 
But  sincerity  is  the  one  thing  that  some  of  their 
critics  refuse  to  attribute  to  them.  Melina,  in  the 
second  act,  recites  her  own  defense — and,  for  that 
matter,  the  defense  of  the  woman  whom  she  typifies: 
"No,  my  friend.  Don't  wonder  that  I  should  be 
able  to  play  a  part  so  well.  Leave,  I  pray  you,  to 
woman  her  rights  to  falsify  .  .  .  She  has  re- 
course to  it  perforce;  to  make  men  understand  cer- 
tain details  that,  in  any  other  manner,  they  would 
not  grasp;  to  lead  them  toward  necessary  resolu- 
tions, which  otherwise  they  would  not  reach,  re- 
strained as  they  are  by  a  thousand  scruples  that  we 
women  don't  possess.     .     .     ." 

Worse,  if  possible,  though  not  less  interesting 
from  the  student's  standpoint,  is  Cavacchioli's 
She  Who  Resembles  You  {^uella  che  f  Assomiglia)^ 
which,  from  beginning  to  end  is,  as  a  play,  utterly 
bad.  A  technique  of  spectres,  puppets,  and  abstrac- 
tion furnishes  amusement  of  a  sort  not  intended  by 
the  young  writer.  Here,  as  in  The  Bird  of  Paradise , 
is  an  inept  mingling  of  this  world  and  the  other,  of 
genre  and  device,  constituting  a  distinctly  retro- 
gressive step.     Because  a  man  is  of  the  scientific 


204        THE  DRAMA  OF  TRANSITION 

persuasion,  he  nuist  go  around,  to  reveal  his  en- 
gineering procHvities,  with  small  wheels  where  his 
eyes  are  supposed  to  be.  The  professor  of  the  play 
— a  chiromancer,  by  the  way — uses  diH'ercnt  lights 
in  his  office,  according  to  the  supposed  nature  of  the 
visitor.  One  of  those  visitors  must,  oi  course,  be  a 
woman  with  whom  he  develops  a  liaison.  Her  hus- 
band, a  new  Enoch  Arden,  returns  from  the  war, 
blind.  The  struggle  is  now  between  the  two  men 
for  the  woman,  who,  when  at  last  the  choice  is 
definitely  presented  to  her,  repeats  the  tale  of 
Ibsen's  L^/h-  froyyi  the  Sea  and  Shaw's  Candida^  by 
choosing  the  husband. 

Most  outlines  violate  a  play  so  sketched;  this  one 
does  the  play  more  than  justice,  for  it  does  not  men- 
tion the  child's  play  of  the  engineer's  puppets,  used 
much  as  Marinetti  has  used  similar  marionettes  in 
his  Elettricitd,  Sessuale;  it  does  not  tell  of  the  ghost 
of  Gabriella's  husband,  who  alternates  with  his  own 
realitv,  nor  of  the  mystical  effects  of  organ  tones 
and  like  theatricalities.  It  conveys  no  notion  of  the 
actual  nightmare-effects  achieved.  The  strange  part 
of  it  all  is  that  these  plays  have  been  produced,  and 
by  such  actors  as  V'irgilio  Talli.  For  a  combination 
of  distraction,  imagination  gone  astray,  emptiness  of 
content,  and  futility  of  means,  they  are  difficult  to 
match  in  any  civilized  nation.  It  is  not  a  question 
of  a  new  technique  that  must  companion  a  new  idea. 
These  writers  have  no  new  ideas.  Pirandello,  em- 
inent before  them,  retains  his  pre-eminency  now. 
He  is  bigger  than  the  "grotesque"  movement,  which, 
thus  far,  has  but  groped  in  the  dark  to  a  greater 
darkness.  As  an  aesthetic,  as  well  as  a  national  in- 
stitution, the  Italian  theatre  is  in  a  bad  way. 


SOUTH  AMERICA 


SOUTH   AMERICA 


The  drama  in  South  America,  whether  in  the 
cluster  of  republics  that  speak  Spanish  or  in  vast 
Portuguese-speaking  Brazil,  has  undergone  but  spo- 
radic development.  Though  in  a  number  of  the 
countries  it  may  be  studied  with  interest  in  the  work 
of  salient  individuals,  it  yet  fails  to  present  that 
ordered  progress  which  produces  the  impression  of 
a  national  product.  If,  then,  I  choose  the  stage  of 
Buenos  Aires  and  Montevideo  for  chief  considera- 
tion, it  is  because  here,  at  least,  may  be  followed 
something  like  an  evolution  from  mere  imitation  to 
autonomous  production,  and  because,  moreover, 
that  stage  presents  a  number  of  historic  novelties. 
The  history  of  most  drama  reveals  a  religious 
origin;  the  Yiddish  stage,  however,  was  born  of  the 
restaurants  of  Rumania,  with  their  song-loving 
exiles;  the  Argentino-Uruguayan  stage  possesses  the 
unique  distinction  of  having  been  cradled  in  a  circus- 
ring.  Here,  too,  we  come  upon  the  romantic  figure 
of  the  gaucho,  who  has  not  yet  disappeared  from  the 
national  literature,  though  he  is  as  extinct  in  na- 
tional life  as  is  our  own  cowboy  counterpart.  And, 
to  prove  that  one  touch  of  civilization  makes  the 
whole  theatrical  world  kin,  the  Argentine  stage  to- 
day boasts  as  trivial  comedies  and  revues  as  may  be 
matched  in  any  capital  of  Europe  or  the  United 
States,  with  an  organization  of  managers  that  is  as 

207 


208       THE  DRAMA  OF   FRAXSITION 

impervious  to  beauty  as  any  Broadway  potentate 
of  the  proscenium. 

The  immediate  outlook  for  the  genuine  develop- 
ment of  the  theatre  in  Argentina  is  not  regarded  as 
highly  encouraging,  despite  a  number  of  authors 
capable  of  good  work.  The  comment  of  tho-^c 
critics  whose  lines  are  worth  reading  is  anything 
but  cheerful,  and  it  is  to  be  suspected — from  such 
as  we  are  able  to  read  in  print—  that  the  dramas  to 
which  their  profession  takes  them  provide  only  too 
valid  a  basis  for  their  plaints. 

Two  chief  causes  ha\e  been  brought  forward  to 
explain  the  undoubted  decline  through  which  the 
better  play  is  passing  in  Buenos  Aires:  first,  the  ex- 
aggerated commercial  character  of  the  managers — 
a  cry  that  has  become  synonymous,  it  would  seem, 
with  management  the  world  over — and  second,  the 
Society  of  Authors,  where  the  chief  topic  of  dis- 
cussion is  not  drama,  but  money. 

A  sign  of  the  times  appears  in  the  announcements 
issued  by  stage  managements  and  by  the  authors' 
society  itself:  the  amounts  of  money  made  on  the 
various  plays  are  blazoned  forth,  and  the  authors 
are  listed,  by  their  own  society,  in  the  order  of  their 
financial  success  tor  the  preceding  season.  All  this, 
and  more,  from  the  pen  of  Antonio  Viergol,  who  is 
not  an  Argentine,  but  who  is  so  well  known  in  the 
country  and  knows  its  stage  so  well,  that  his  opinion 
was  requested  and  given — be  it  said  in  his  honor — 
with  the  utmost  candor. 

Viergol  finds  the  Argentine  stage  suffering  from 
what  he  calls  "metalization" — the  greed  for  coin. 
The  artistic  aspect  has  so  far  disappeared  that  the 
business  is  really  a  form  of  industrial  exploitation, 


SOUTH  AMERICA  209 

and  the  aims  of  the  founders  have  been  forgotten. 
A  veritable  "manufacturers'  trust"  is  the  result, 
through  which  the  supply  of  plays  is  controlled  by 
a  would-be  monopoly,  as  in  any  industrial  circle. 
Such  a  state  of  affairs  works  in  two  directions.  By 
its  positive  action  it  vitiates  the  public  taste  and  the 
authors  vvho  are  willing  to  cater  to  it;  negatively,  it 
keeps  the  genuine  artists  from  producing  the  plays 
which  are  foredoomed  to  inadequate  presentation 
and  reception.  Among  these  better  dramatists  are 
men  like  Iglesias  Paz,  Gonzalez  Castillo,  Martinez 
Cuitino,  Otto  M.  Clone,  Garcia  Velloso  (author  of 
a  history  of  his  nation's  letters),  Perez  Petit  (a  good 
novelist),  Roberto  Payro  (another).  It  is  the  opinion 
of  more  than  one  competent  judge  that  the  times 
are  ready  for  change.  The  query  is,  how  long  will 
it  take  for  the  change  to  become  effective? 

One  question — and  a  fundamental  one — that 
Viergol  did  not  touch  upon  in  his  reply,  which  was 
in  reality  a  personal  letter  to  a  friend  rather  than  a 
treatise,  was  years  ago  pointed  out  by  the  best 
known  Argentine  theatrical  critic,  and,  incidentally, 
one  of  the  most  readable  of  the  modern  men  of  the 
theatre.  Juan  Pablo  Echagiie,  critic  for  the  Nacion^ 
is  in  his  writings  a  well-balanced  nationalist,  alert 
to  the  sincerity  of  real  artistry. 

As  far  back  as  1907  he  indicated  the  root  of  the 
evil  that  blighted  so  vast  a  percentage  of  native 
dramaturgical  effort.  That  effort  was  not  genuinely 
native.  It  did  not  observe  directly  from  life,  but 
wrote  with  an  eye  upon  other  nations  and  other 
men's  books.  It  had  no  feeling  for  the  sterner  art 
of  the  theatre — that  art  which  eschews  extended 
exposition    and    the    relation    of  events    instead    of 


210        THE  DRAMA  OF  TRANSITION 

presenting  them  synthetically.  He  had  harsh  words 
for  the  contemporary  productions,  but  his  harsh- 
ness was  born  of  his  love  for  the  theatre,  for  his 
nation  and  fellow  men.  If  he  spoke  of  "desolating 
mediocrity"  and  the  "disquieting  superabundance" 
of  the  plays,  he  was  none  the  less  eager  to  praise 
the  good,  and  his  labors  are  indubitably  one  of  the 
factors  that  will  aid  in  the  restoration  of  the  Ar- 
gentine theatre. 

To  Jean  Paul  the  .Argentine  stage,  from  the  very 
circumstances  of  its  surroundings  and  its  soil,  should 
be  essentially  a  place  of  optimism  and  confidence 
in  the  present  and  the  future,  "with  a  comforting 
moral  leaven."  Just  what  is  to  emerge  from  the 
contem{X)rary  era  of  money  and  trade  cannot  be 
predicted,  but  so  perspicacious  a  thinker  as  Fran- 
cisco Garcia  Calderon,  in  commenting  upon  a  col- 
lection of  Jean  Paul's  critical  reviews,  sees  the  rise 
of  a  new  comic  impulse,  which  will  be  fed  by  the 
types  produced  in  a  country  where  new  fortunes 
make  a  sort  of  new-world  "bourgeois  gentilhomme"; 
he  sees,  too,  the  possibility  of  a  varied  scene  reveal- 
ing the  contact  of  the  different  races  that  are  build- 
ing up  that  new  world,  the  drama  of  advancing 
democratic  ideals,  and  so  on.* 

But  there  is  little  to  feed  such  hopes,  in  the  present 
product,  at  least.  To  have  great  poets,  Whitman 
told  us,  there  must  be  great  audiences,  too.  .Ar- 
gentine has  the  poets,  the  playwrights;  but  has  it, 

'  See  EchagUe's  Un  Teatro  en  FormaciSn,  Buenos  Aires.  Scflor  Echagfle's 
views  exhibit  a  somewhat  excessive  eagerness  to  turn  the  stage  to  didactic,  and 
even  "moral,"  purposes.  He  does  not  seem  to  possess  a  deep  sense  of  dynamic 
jpsthetics,  and  his  otherwise  admirable  critiques  suffer  from  an  undercurrent  of 
moralistic  suggestion.  He  is,  in  short,  a  transition-critic  of  a  transition-drama. 
A  useful  book  to  be  read  as  a  corrective  to  Echagtle  is  Alfredo  A.  Blanchi's  Teatro 
Nacional,  Buenos  Aires. 


SOUTH  AMERICA  211 

yet,    the    audiences,    the    managers,    the    national 
auditorium  ? 

THE  "GAUCHO" 

For  a  proper  appreciation  of  the  strange  plays 
that  developed  out  of  the  circus-ring  interludes,  one 
should  have  an  outline  knowledge,  at  least,  of  the 
poetry  of  Argentina  and  Uruguay  as  represented 
by  those  authors  who  helped  to  establish  and  carry 
on  the  literary  tradition  of  the  gaucho  type.  The 
gaucho  himself,  if  not  entirely  a  mystery,  is  much 
of  a  puzzle  from  his  very  origin.  Indeed,  the  word 
itself  is  a  philological  problem.  We  have  it  on 
high  authority  that  it  was  neither  known  nor  written 
in  Spain  before  it  was  brought  over  from  the  western 
hemisphere.  According  to  the  noted  Argentine 
scholar,  Paul  Groussac,  it  is  an  Incaic  term,  signify- 
ing orphan,  abandoned,  wandering,  with  a  some- 
what derogatory  connotation,  and  was  originally 
guachOy  the  change  occurring  by  the  well-known 
linguistic  phenomenon  of  metathesis.  It  was  this 
form  of  the  word,  by  the  way,  that  Walter  Scott 
employed,  being  the  first  to  give  the  term  wide 
currency  in  our  tongue.  And  it  was  Carlyle,  in  his 
essay  upon  the  Paraguayan  tyrant,  Dr.  Francia, 
who  presented  an  interpretation  of  the  gaucho  which 
has  won  high  praise  from  South  Americans  for  its 
perspicacity.  According  to  another  etymology, 
gaucho  comes  from  an  Araucanian  word  for  "com- 
rade." The  origin  of  the  type  itself,  however,  is 
less  troublesome;  the  gaucho  is  not  an  indigenous 
product;  he  is,  like  his  songs  and  his  troubadours, 
(called  payadores  or  cantores)  of  partly  Andalusian 
parentage.     From    birth    habituated    to    the    vast 


212        THE  DRAMA  OF  TRANSITION 

extent  of  the  pampas  he  acquires  a  bravery  that  is, 
like  his  other  attributes,  the  product  of  his  environ- 
ment acting  upon  mixed  hereditary  influences — often 
the  union  of  Spanish  and  Indian  blood.  That  same 
vast  solitude  is  perhaps  the  cause  of  his  pensive  moods; 
his  poetry  is  the  reflection  of  his  heart.  He  is  a 
born  singer.  In  the  lines  ol  Hernandez*  famous 
^aiicho  poem  Martin  Fienn: 

Yo  no  soy  cantor  Ictrao 
mas  si  mc  pongo  a  cantar 
no  tcngo  cuamio  acabar 
y  mc  cnvezco  cantando. 
Las  coplas  mc  van  brotando 
como  agua  dc  manantial. 

(I  am  nor  a  lettered  singer,  but  once  I  begin  to  sing 
1  never  can  stop,  and  I  grow  old  singing.  The  verses 
gush  from  me  like  water  from  a  spring.)  His  poetry 
is  halt  his  interpretation  of  nature  as  he  knows  it; 
superstition  is  the  other  half.  Witches  and  medicine 
men  play  an  important  part  in  his  life,  as  do  music 
and  love.  He  is  generous  to  a  fault,  and  indolent 
as  well.  His  independence,  u|X)n  provocation,  be- 
comes a  romantic  sort  of  outlawry;  his  love,  like- 
wise, may  blossom  into  bloodv  flowers;  even  into 
his  poetry  and  minstrelsy  he  injects  the  element  of 
rivalry,  and  enjoys  the  spectacle  of  two  contesting 
bards  determined  to  outwit  each  other  at  the  ^ame 
of  jesting  and  caustic  improvisation. 

In  the  opinion  of  a  recent  writer  upon  the  at- 
tractive theme,  the  gaucho  was  (for  the  type  is  fast 
disappearing)  above  all  a  transplanted  Andalusian. 
In  the  early  days  of  emigration  to  the  New  World, 
Andalusia,  because  of  its  situation,  furnished  a  ready 
point  of  embarkation. 


SOUTH  AMERICA  213 

These  transplanted  Andalusians  felt  quite  at  home 
on  the  sunny  stretches  of  the  Rio  de  la  Plata.  Them- 
selves a  fusion  of  Aryan  and  Semitic  strains,  they 
reproduced  their  ancient  lite  in  their  new  surround- 
ings, even  carrying  over  peculiarities  of  the  Anda- 
lusian  dialect.  From  xAndalusia,  too,  they  imported 
their  beloved  guitar,  as  well  as  the  sensual  sadness 
of  their  songs,  and  the  payador^  their  minstrel. 
And  just  as  the  gaucho  was  largely  a  product  of  the 
new  surroundings,  so  is  his  disappearance  due  in 
great  measure  to  a  change  in  the  economic  environ- 
ment. With  the  development  of  civilization  came  a 
regularity  that  the  free  spirit  of  the  pampas  could 
not  brook;  the  gaucho  withdrew  into  his  own  realm, 
proud,  defiant,  even  arrogant  in  his  defeat. 

From  the  fourth  decade  of  the  previous  century, 
down  to  the  threshold  of  the  twentieth,  poetry  in 
the  Argentine  has  occupied  itself  with  the  gaucho. 
Notable  exponents  of  the  theme  were  J.  M.  Gutier- 
rez, Bartolome  Mitre,  Hilario  Ascasubi,  Ricardo 
Gutierrez,  Estanislao  del  Campo  (author  of  the 
famous,  humoristic  Fausto)^  and  Jose  Hernandez, 
poet  of  the  still  more  famous  Martin  Fierro.  Rafael 
Obligado,  whose  death  occurred  on  March  14,  1920, 
also  belongs  in  this  list.  In  prose  the  gaucho  is  best 
known  through  Sarmiento's  Facundo  and  Eduardo 
Gutierrez'  novel  'Juan  Moreira.,  which,  by  some,  he 
is  supposed  to  have  elaborated  into  one  of  those 
circus  pantomimes  that  led  to  the  gaucho  drama.^ 

'  See,  howe%'er,  the  Introduction  to  Three  Plays  of  the  Argentine,  translated  by 
Jacob  S.  Fassett,  Jr.,  with  editorial  material  by  Edward  Hale  Bierstadt,  New 
York,  1920.  Bierstadt  asserts  that  the  dramatization  was  made  by  Podesta,  and 
cites  as  support  Rodolfo  Fausto  Rodrisuez'  Conliibucidn  al  estudio  del  teatro 
nacional.  The  whole  matter  is  somewhat  uncertain.  ".  .  .  Many  of  the  plays 
are  dramatized  versions  of  actual  poems,  which  served  almost  as  substitutes  for 
the  novel  in  tne  earlier  days  of  Argentine  literature.  The  result  is  that  the  orig- 
inal poems  and  the  later  plays  are  sometimes  hopelessly  confused."    Page  xxxiv.) 


214       THE  DRAMA  OF  TRANSITION 

Traveling  circuses  became  an  institution  in  the 
early  days  of  the  republic,  and  were  gradually  varied 
by  short,  quasi-impromptu  plays  that  could  appeal 
to  the  scant  intellectual  equipment  of  their  rustic 
patrons.  "These  plays,"  says  Mr.  Bierstadt,  "were 
for  the  most  part  frank  melodramas  which  were  all 
written  about  the  national  Hgure,  the  gaucho.  In 
time  the  plays  took  form  until  there  came  to  be  a 
definite  repertory,  and,  after  a  certain  point,  \\<^ 
additions  were  made  to  this,  so  that  we  have  a 
small  group  of  plays  repeated  for  years  all  over  the 
country,  adored  by  the  people,  and,  in  due  course, 
scoffed  at  by  those  wise  ones  whose  taste  had  been 
benefitted  by  European  excursions.  And  the  plays 
grew  in  body  and  interest  until,  from  being  merely  an 
act  of  the  circus  proper,  they  divorced  themselves 
from  their  progenitor  entirely  and  demanded  a  place 
of  their  own.  The  two  great  theatrical  managers  of 
Buenos  Aires  to-day — they  are  actor-managers  and 
producers — are  the  brothers  Podesta,  who  many 
years  ago  began  their  career  as  members  of  a  family 
of  acrobats  in  a  traveling  circus  which  included  the 
gaucho  plays." 

The  native  product,  then,  springs  from  the  circus 
ring,  and  is  less  than  forty  years  old.  Of  course, 
dramas  had  been  written  in  Argentina  long  before 
the  eventful  July  2  of  1884,  when  the  tale  of  the 
gaucho  Juan  Moreira  was  enacted  in  pantomime  as 
the  novelty  of  a  circus  performance;  yet  it  is  this 
humble  occurrence,  together  with  the  production, 
in  April,  1886,  of  a  spoken  version  of  the  same  re- 
nowned tale,  that  founds  the  native  drama  of  the 
Argentine.  What  had  gone  before  was  imitation 
and  perpetuation  of  Spanish   models.     Here,  how- 


SOUTH  AMERICA  215 

ever,  we  come  face  to  face  with  the  scenes,  the  types, 
the  temperaments  of  the  land;  rough,  devoid  of  art, 
defective  in  a  hundred  ways,  if  you  will,  but  unmis- 
takably of  the  soil  and  destined  to  bear  ripe  fruit 
within  two  decades. 

For  a  time  the  native  stage  is  trod  by  an  army  of 
gaucho  heroes,  all  cut  from  the  same  pattern.  There 
are  Martin  Fierro,  Juan  Cuello,  Julian  Jimenez, 
Juan  Soldao — a  sturdy  band  of  outlaws  in  conflict 
with  a  nascent  civilization.  Bold  men  these,  but 
not  wholly  bad,  incarnating  the  rough  honesty  of  a 
pioneer  epoch.  But  the  type  begins  to  undergo  a 
change,  and  the  change  is  at  last  definitely  impressed 
upon  the  spectators  by  Martimano  Leguizamon, 
with  his  Calandria.  This  play,  first  given  on  May 
21,  1896,  marked  the  reaction  against  the  exaggera- 
tion of  the  gaucho  drama,  though  it  is  a  brother  to 
the  long  line  of  predecessors.  Leguizamon's  sig- 
nificant contribution  was,  in  the  words  of  Roberto 
F.  Giusti,^  his  conversion  of  the  "rebellious,  quarrel- 
some gaucho  into  a  good,  industrious  native;  he 
abandoned  the  routine  of  bloodshed  and  interpreted 
the  natural  evolution  that  had  taken  place  in  the 
fields.  The  national  theatre,  born  of  the  truculent 
melodrama,  was  shown  to  be  improving  within  its 
own  mould." 

During  all  this  time  the  taste  for  music  and  dance 
with  the  plays  had  not  gone  unsatisfied.  As  the 
gaucho  themes  began  to  show  signs  of  having  yielded 
all  the  variety  of  which  they  were  capable,  popular 
taste  veered  to  the  national  equivalent  of  Spanish 
reviews,  zarzuelas,  and  one-act  musical  farces. 
Here,  as  in  the  previous  orientations  of  the  Argen- 

'  See  his  important  booK,  Florenao  Sanchez,  Buenos  Aires. 


216        THE  UKAMA  OF  TR.ANSITIOX 

tine  stage,  the  Podesta  brothers  were  the  path- 
blazers,  and  when,  on  April  6,  1898,  they  established 
themselves  in  the  Teatro  Apolo,  they  gave  to  a 
drama  that  they  had  originated  in  the  sawdust  ring 
its  first  permanent  home. 

This  hybrid  entertainment  was  ot  most  varied 
nature,  presenting  a  host  of  types  whose  background 
was  usually  the  slums  of  the  suburb.  Not  the  plot 
itself,  but  its  ingreilients,  was  the  important  thing. 
We  learn  that  this  stage  was  even  used  for  moral 
purposes,  being  converted  by  some  authors  into  a 
strange  pulpit  whence  issued  "between  a  tango  and 
a  scene  of  seduction"  the  bitter  philosophy  that  is 
born  of  life  in  the  slums.  Giusti  relates  this  doc- 
trinaire tendency  to  the  inHuence  acquired  by 
Gorki,  who  grew  popular  as  one  of  the  results  of  the 
Russian  revolution  of  1905. 

The  point  is  worth  passing  notice,  nor  is  it  by  any 
means  the  sole  instance  of  Slavic  influence  in  Spanish- 
.-\mcrican  letters. 

The  Teatro  .Apolo  encouraged  native  authorship 
greatly;  it  was  not  yet  a  question  ot  anything  like 
art,  however.  Subjects  multiply,  views  and  aims 
whirl  about  in  unconscionable  confusion  in  the  labors 
of  a  new  birth.  And  surely  enough,  upon  June  16, 
1 902,  there  is  given  the  initial  pcrfonr.ance  of  Martin 
Coronado's  La  piedra  de  escdndaln^  which  achieved 
the  startling  record  of  more  than  a  thousand  per- 
formances. With  this  play  yet  anr)ther  phase  of 
the  gaiicho  is  signalized — that  of  the  former  nomad 
now  domesticated  in  the  rural  scene. 

\  split  between  the  Podesta  brothers  soon  re- 
sulted in  Jose  retaining  the  A]X)lo  and  Jeronimo 
assuming  charge  of  the  Teatro  de  la  Comedia.     .At 


SOUTH  AMERICA  217 

the  Comedia  it  was  that  the  next  important  step 
in  the  evolution  of  the  Argentine  theatre  took  place, 
on  the  13th  of  August,  1903.  The  play  was  M'hijo 
el  dotor  {My  Son  the  Doctor)  ^  by  Florencio  Sanchez. 
The  date  marks  the  definite  entrance  of  modern 
realism.  It  is  only  right  to  indicate,  as  Giusti  and 
others  have  done,  that  Sanchez  was  by  no  means 
the  sole  innovator;  a  number  of  men  whose  names 
are  important  in  the  history  of  Argentine  and  Uru- 
guayan letters  served  as  collaborators  in  the  trans- 
formation, among  them  Victor  Perez  Petit,  Enrique 
Garcia  Velloso,  David  Pena,  Roberto  J.  Payro, 
Alberto  Ghiraldo,  Julio  Sanchez  Gardell,  Vicente 
Martinez  Cuitiiio.  The  public  was  all  this  time 
being  prepared,  and,  to  employ  a  useful  figure, 
Sanchez  was  the  crest  of  the  wave  rather  than  the 
wave  itself.  From  the  date  of  this  historical  pro- 
duction through  the  following  five  years  a  stren- 
uous activity  is  felt  in  the  field  of  the  drama.  Sanchez 
himself,  who  was  destined  to  live  but  seven  years 
longer,  wrote  twenty  pieces,  a  large  proportion  of 
them  worthy  of  preservation.  If,  since  his  death, 
the  stage  has  declined,  there  are  several  valid  reasons. 
Natural  reaction  may  be  one;  a  too  indulgent  atti- 
tude from  the  critics,  another;  a  third,  the  Society 
of  Authors,  which  seeks  long  and  profitable  "runs" 
rather  than  lofty,  artistic  goals.  Indeed,  Setior 
Giusti,  whose  work  as  a  critic  is  characterized  by  a 
certain  aloofness  of  manner,  and  whose  style  is 
straightforward,  lacking  the  usual  embellishments 
of  the  Spanish-American  temperament,  openly  de- 
clares in  his  recent  little  book  on  Florencio  Sanchez 
that  '  the  Argentine  theatre  is  commercialized,  and 
its  war  machinery  is   the  Society  of  Authors;  the 


218       THE  DR.AMA  OF  TRANSITION 

Uruguayan,  for  obvious  reasons,  is  not  yet  com- 
mercialized. Though  these  theatres  were  born  to- 
gether, already  they  are  beginning  to  show  each 
other  their  teeth." 

FLORENCIO  SANCHEZ 

By  interesting  coincidence  in  the  literary  history 
of  Uruguay,  two  of  its  noted  men,  toward  the  un- 
suspected and  premature  end  ot  their  lives,  sought 
the  inspiration  of  Europe.  Jose  Enrique  Rodo,  him- 
self one  of  the  great  apostles  of  travel  as  a  stimulus 
toward  unceasing  self-renewal,  left  for  the  Old 
World  during  the  war  that  was  ushering  in  a  new, 
but  what  he  considered  the  journey's  beginning 
proved  the  journey's  end.  Death  overtook  him  in 
Italy — a  wretched  figure  many  leagues  from  home, 
fairly  abandoned,  stranded.  To  be  sure  the  over- 
sight was  later  atoned  for,  and  when  Rodo's  remains 
were  returned  to  his  native  land  they  were  received 
with  the  honors  shown  to  a  president. 

With  I'^lorencio  Sanchez,  perhaps  the  most  vital 
of  latter-day  Spanish-American  dramatists,  the  case 
was  somewhat  different.  His  goal  had  always  been 
not  so  much  Europe  as  the  boot-shaped  peninsula 
in  particular.  He  knew  Italian  and  the  Italians, 
whom  he  had  portrayed  in  his  plays;  he  had  profited 
by  suggestions  from  the  modern  Italian  dramatists; 
he  had  felt  that  Italy  would  spell  another  step 
toward  fame.  In  Italy  it  was  that  he  found,  outside 
of  his  native  scene,  the  most  sympathetic  apprecia- 
tion. Yet  death,  not  glory,  greeted  him  there,  and 
though  all  this  happened  some  years  before  Rodo 
followed  him  thither,  only  the  other  day  were  the 
remains  of  Sanchez  returned  to  the  land  of  his  birth, 


SOUTH  AMERICA  219 

where  representatives  from  four  nations  received 
them  with  the  highest  honors.  It  was  in  1910  that 
Sanchez  died  of  tuberculosis;  perhaps  the  recent 
return  of  Rodo  stirred  up  a  cry  for  similar  honors 
to  one  who  had  brought  similar  distinction  to 
Uruguay.  At  any  rate,  the  man  who,  living,  found 
it  so  difficult  to  procure  governmental  assistance  for 
his  voyage  across,  found  a  host  of  prominent  Uru- 
guayans, Brazilians,  Argentines,  and  Chileans  await- 
ing him  on  his  delayed  return. 

It  should  not  be  inferred  from  this,  however, 
that  Sanchez  was  a  neglected  genius,  for  his  labors, 
once  they  were  definitely  launched,  met  with  gen- 
erous and  continued  response.  The  roots  of  the 
romantic  career  led  by  this  gifted  dramatist  lie  else- 
where than  in  the  indifference  of  a  public  and  the 
critics'  lack  of  discernment;  they  sink  deep  into  the 
personality  of  the  man  himself.  Sanchez  was  essen- 
tially a  wandering,  bohemian  spirit,  a  slave  to  his 
instincts,  writing  chiefly  under  the  compulsion  of 
need;  he  was  generous,  yet  like  so  many  generous 
persons,  withdrawn;  he  became,  after  his  early  ex- 
periences in  internecine  warfare,  radical  and  unre- 
strained; he  was  successful,  appreciated,  and,  de- 
spite what  more  than  one  apologetic  spokesman 
has  written,  was  prevented  only  by  his  personal  in- 
adaptability from  enjoying  a  long  life  of  increasing 
success  and  fame.  This  is  not  said  by  way  of  re- 
proach, nor  written  from  a  lofty  moral  eminence; 
Sanchez  was  the  most  tolerant  of  mortals,  harsh 
though  some  of  the  theses  of  his  later  plays  may  be, 
and  we  may  well  display  his  own  human  spirit  in 
considering  him.  Out  of  his  personal  frailty  he 
built  some  plays  of  enduring  note — dramas  that  will 


220        THK  DRAMA  ()!•    IKANSITION 

live  in  the  history  of  the  Continent  as  part  of  its 
intellectual  development.  Thev  will  not  for  a  while 
provide  texts  for  professors  of  literature  to  annotate 
and  to  comment  upon;  they  spurted  like  huge 
sparks  from  the  furnace  of  life  and  not  infrequently 
display  the  defects,  as  well  as  the  virtues,  of  spon- 
taneity and  improvisation.  But  they  are  so  human 
in  implication,  so  intimately  Ixnmd  up  with  the 
history  of  Sanchez,  of  his  day  and  his  milieu,  that 
to  study  any  one  of  these  elements  is,  by  connota- 
tion, to  study  the  others. 

I'he  outstantling  figure  of  Spanish-American  drama 
was  born  on  January  17,  1875,  '"  Montevideo.  He 
was  the  first  in  a  brood  of  children  that  was  to 
number  eleven.  He  received  a  common  school  ed- 
ucation, which  was  later  added  to  by  a  course  in  a 
liceOy  and  it  was  not  long  before  he  was  scribbling 
away  during  moments  stolen  from  his  jxjsition  as 
clerk  in  the  Junta  Administrativa.  As  early  as  his 
fifteenth  year  he  felt  the  thrill  of  beholding  his 
work  in  print,  and  it  is  significant  that  his  first 
efforts  were  in  the  direction  of  miniature  social  satire, 
under  the  Knglish  pseudonym.  Jack  the  Ripper. 
He  was  of  the  wandering  fraternity,  and  it  was 
always  far  more  easy  to  find  him  among  the  news- 
paper offices  or  amidst  the  popular  tumult  than  at 
home.  Withal,  he  was  a  good-natured  sort,  and  if 
his  schooling  was  limited,  he  made  up  for  this  in 
part  by  a  quick  mind  and  a  ready  observation. 
From  the  start,  in  his  literary  beginnings  he  exhibited 
a  preference  for  the  dialogue  method  of  composition, 
as  if  feeling  in  him  the  eventual  call  to  the  stage. 
His  short  experience  as  assistant  in  the  office  of 
police   statistics    and    measurements   was    valuable. 


SOUTH  AMERICA  221 

A  letter  written  to  a  friend  when  Sanchez  was  in 
his  eighteenth  year  shows  the  future  dramatist, 
however,  to  be  an  outspoken  liberal  of  anti-clerical 
beliefs,  and  anything  but  a  model  law-abiding 
citizen.  But  this  marked  element  in  the  man's 
nature  did  not  burst  forth  until  the  Revolution  of 
1896.  His  part  in  the  actual  fighting  has  not  yet 
been  made  clear,  but  it  is  believed  that  he  was  in 
the  thick  of  some  of  the  fighting;  there  is  even  a 
story  that  during  the  battle  of  Cerros  Blancos, 
which  lasted  through  May  15  and  16,  he  was  so 
overwhelmed  by  the  horrible  sight  of  national 
fratricide  that  he  began  to  shout  protest  at  the  top 
of  his  lungs.  This  marks  the  definite  turning-point 
in  the  formation  of  the  man's  mentality,  and  is  at 
the  same  time  a  symbol  of  his  attitude  toward  that 
greater  battle  which  he  called  life. 

Sanchez'  reaction  to  these  experiences  revealed 
itself  in  a  period  of  bohemian  anarchism.  Often  he 
took  the  trip  between  the  sister  cities  of  Monte- 
video and  Buenos  Aires,  now  in  quest  of  work,  now 
intent  upon  eluding  the  pursuing  police.  Since 
these  ardent  spirits  cannot  separate  politics  from 
literature,  the  International  Centre  of  Sociological 
Studies,  which  he  joined,  gave  theatrical  performances 
in  Spanish  and  ItaHan;  Sanchez  acted  in  some  of 
these,  and  recited  for  the  assembly  his  social  crit- 
icisms in  the  form  of  dialogues.  Here  he  probably 
received  his  definite  impulse  toward  dramatic  author- 
ship, presenting  a  small  piece  called  Ladrones 
{Robbers). 

The  year  1898  found  him  back  in  Buenos  Aires, 
on  a  new  periodical,  but  not  for  long;  he  simply 
could  not  submit  himself  to  routine  or  regularity. 


222        THE  DRAMA  OF  TRANSITION 

That  he  was  cognizant  of  his  own  shortcomings  is 
shown  by  his  letter  of  resignation,  in  which  he  de- 
clares his  inability  to  change  his  reprehensible  ways. 
As  so  often  happens,  the  man  who  had  such  a  trench- 
ant pen  for  the  evils  of  society  could  not  check 
his  personal  extravagances;  perhaps,  indeed,  his 
lifelong  criticism  of  society,  mankind,  and  life  itself 
was  a  projection  of  his  conscience  into  the  field  of 
art.  He  who  had  once  been  so  fervent  a  nationalist 
was  now  writing  articles  turning  a  cold  shoulder 
upon  the  gaiicho  tradition  and  looking  resolutely 
toward  the  future.  This,  again,  is  one  of  the  ele- 
ments that  is  to  make  of  his  drama  a  distinct  con- 
tribution to  the  progress  of  the  stage.  In  1901  we 
discover  him  established  in  Montevideo  and  trying 
to  infuse  life  into  a  daily  devoted  to  the  interests 
of  the  working-class  and  called  Trahajo  (Labor). 
The  founder,  however,  could  not  be  got  to  live  up 
to  the  noble  name  of  his  organ,  and  as  a  result  his 
friends  quarreled  with  Sanchez,  who  flew  off  again 
to  .Argentina.  He  engages  in  one  venture  after 
another,  now  at  the  head  of  a  newspaper,  now  won- 
dering where  his  next  meal  is  to  come  from.  He 
summons  energy  enough  to  think  of  a  maid  and 
marriage,  and  the  new  ideal  instills  new  life  into  him. 
He  keeps  his  journalistic  employers  uneasv,  lest  he 
print  something  that  shall  bring  the  law  down  upon 
their  offices;  he  writes  a  play  that  is  but  the  con- 
tinuation of  his  social  criticism,  and  does  not  trouble 
to  disguise  the  persons  against  whom  his  attack  is 
launched,  but  the  piece  is  prohibited  in  time,  through 
the  efforts  of  the  chief  figure  satirized.  Not  without 
a  battle,  however,  in  which  Sanchez  is  seized  bv 
the  police,  only   to  be  freed  through   the  muscular 


SOUTH  AMERICA  223 

intervention  of  spectators  who  resented  the  over- 
officious  brutality  of  the  gendarmerie. 

The  ambition  for  success  on  the  stage  now  throbbed 
powerfully  in  Sanchez'  veins.  His  fourth  composi- 
tion, Canillita^  actually  provided  a  new  word  for 
the  Argentines,  who,  since  the  first  production  of 
the  little  piece  in  Buenos  Aires,  have  given  that 
name  to  the  news-vendors.  But  before  this  piece 
had  reached  the  Argentine  capital,  the  central  event 
in  Sanchez'  life  had  taken  place:  My  Son  the  Doc- 
tor was  produced,  as  we  have  seen,  in  1903,  and 
established  its  author  at  once.  Inspiration  there 
may  have  been;  accumulated  experience  and  ob- 
servation were  present  in  appreciable  quantity. 
But  the  driving  force  in  the  writing  of  the  play  was 
the  author's  need  of  money  with  which  to  get  mar- 
ried. Four  years  previous  he  had  met  Catalina 
Rabentos  and,  romantically  enough,  had  vowed 
that  they  should  wed  when  he  became  famous.  If 
the  girl's  family  did  not  look  with  kindly  eye  upon 
the  match  none  could  blame  them,  nor  was  the  news 
that  reached  her  of  the  sort  to  inspire  continued 
confidence.  Toward  the  end  of  1902  Florencio  was 
given  to  understand  that  he  must  get  famous  in  a 
hurry,  or  else  the  match  was  off".  His  widow — still 
living — has  told  of  how  he  was  thus  brought  to  the 
verge  of  suicide.  Instead,  he  wrote  the  play  that 
brought  him  renown  and  a  wife.  Its  first  name  was 
The  Two  Consciences,  which  states  more  plainly  than 
the  final  title  the  struggle  between  the  ideas  of 
father  and  son. 

Various  tales  of  this  period  have  gained  currency, 
differing  in  details  of  greater  or  less  importance, 
but  alike  emphasizing  the  poverty-stricken  condition 


224       THE  DRAMA  OF  TR.ANS1TION 

of  the  author.  The  very  doorkeeper  f)f  the  theatre 
where  the  play  was  being  rehearsed  refused  him 
admission  because  he  looked  so  much  like  a  tramp; 
an  advance  was  given  him  so  that  he  might  pur- 
chase a  suit  of  presentable  clothes;  he  might,  at  the 
time,  have  been  under  the  influence  of  drink,  too, 
for  he  was  no  stranger  to  the  cup  that  inebriates  and 
by  no  means  always  cheers. 

From  this  point  the  career  of  Sanchez  merges 
with  the  history  of  the  Argentine  theatre.  Giusti, 
who  made  his  acquaintance  at  the  time  when  the 
author  of  Whijo  el  dolor  was  emerging  into  fame, 
describes  him  as  being  tall,  thin,  with  stooping 
shoulders,  and  with  a  certain  gentle  face  that  re- 
vealed traces  of  an  Indian  element;  his  lower  lip 
fell  toward  a  large  jaw,  imparting  an  air  of  a  good- 
natured  rustic.  There  was  tv)thing  about  the  man 
to  proclaim  his  gifts.  When  interested  in  the  topic 
of  his  conversation  he  would  swing  his  ungainly 
arms  about  and  laugh  with  a  laughter  that  ended 
upon  a  note  of  melancholy.  He  was  one  for  those 
who  knew  him  to  love,  and  he  sKowed  the  need  of 
their  affection.  Though  he  found  much  to  poke  fun 
at  and  deride  in  human  nature,  he  was  fond  of  the 
individual.  Indeed,  in  him,  as  in  many  a  pro- 
claimer  against  the  evils  of  society,  there  was  a 
strange  need  of  individual  kindness  and  a  deep  love 
for  his  fellow  man.  His  anarchism  has  been  called 
lyrical,  and  rightly.  He  was  the  friend  of  all  the 
poor  folk  with  whom  his  plays  are  peopled;  he  was 
very  fond  of  children,  though  he  never  had  any  of 
his  own;  he  liked  animals,  particularly  birds;  there 
was  always  much  of  the  child  and  the  bird  of  passage 
in  him,  and  in  his  own  home  he  was  known  as  the 


SOUTH  AMERICA  225 

"Santito" — the  little  saint.  Legends  to  the  con- 
trary notwithstanding,  his  friends  were  numerous. 
He  met  with  the  envy  and  jealousy  that  all  success 
inspires,  as  well  as  with  the  academic  opposition  of 
critics  who,  not  able  to  institute  facile  comparisons 
with  ^schylus  and  his  compeers  down  to  the  latest 
innovation  of  the  French  dramatists,  dismissed  his 
work  as  lacking  literary  qualities.  The  morality  of 
his  plays  was  attacked.  He  was  accused  of  pla- 
giarism. But  he  was,  on  the  other  hand,  wined  and 
dined,  flattered  by  the  critics,  followed  by  the 
public. 

He  began  to  yearn  for  wider  horizons,  and  after 
.long  knocking  at  the  governmental  door  succeeded 
in  being  named  an  official  commissioner  for  the 
republic.  His  nominal  duty  was  to  make  a  report 
upon  the  advisability  of  his  nation's  taking  part  in 
the  Artistic  Exposition  at  Rome  (1909).  He  was 
given  a  royal  send-off  and  his  parting  words  were 
full  of  a  new  aspiration.  A  winter's  trip  through 
France  and  Italy,  and  a  final  settlement  in  Milan, 
soon  led  to  straits  in  the  latter  city.  His  money  was 
fast  disappearing;  his  health  was  following  it.  This 
he  must  have  foreseen,  for  his  plays  reveal  preoccu- 
pations with  illness.  Even  upon  his  deathbed  he 
held  to  his  anti-clerical  views,  though  he  was  ready 
to  welcome  the  priest  as  a  human  friend.  On  No- 
vember 7,  1 910,  he  died  and  was  buried  in  the 
Musocco  Cemetery  of  <-he  city,  whence  only  lately 
his  remains  were  transported  to  his  native  land. 


Those   of  Sanchez'   critics   who    declaim    against 
the  unliterary  character  of  his  plays  are  partly  right. 


226       THE  DRAMA  Ol-  TRANSITION 

Sanchez  was  no  closet  spirit;  he  wrote,  moreover,  in 
haste,  almost  improvising.  His  early  poverty  had 
forced  him  to  steal  even  the  paper  uyxm  which  he 
composed  his  pieces:  he  would  go  to  the  telegraph 
offices,  pretend  absorption  in  the  writing  of  a  tel- 
egram, and  manage  to  make  off  with  a  block  of 
sheets.  So  accustomed  did  he  become  to  writing 
plays  upon  the  back  of  these  telegraph  blanks  that 
in  later  lite,  when  comparative  affluence  was  his, 
he  would  purchase  blocks  of  them  at  the  office,  as 
he  found  it  impossible  to  compose  upon  the  expen- 
sive paper  presented  to  him  by  admirers. 

And  to  most  of  his  plays  there  is  a  certain  steno- 
graphic rapidity  of  progress  that  actually  suggests 
the  concise  phraseology  of  telegraphic  despatches. 
Even  the  longest  of  them  are  short,  always  contain- 
ing a  first  act  notable  for  the  swiftness  of  the  expo- 
sition. He  dashed  the  plays  off  at  fairly  lightning 
speed,  rarely  revised  or  even  re-read  his  work,  did 
not  always  even  spell  correctly,  paid  little  attention 
(as  might  be  supposed)  to  the  niceties  of  composi- 
tion, and  was  a  failure  when  he  attempted  stylistic 
flights.  Into  some  of  his  best  plays  creeps  an  occa- 
sional speech  that  smacks  of  Kchegarayan  rhetoric 
whose  death  decree  was  signed  by  the  "generation 
of  1898"  across  the  ocean.  But  in  recompense  for 
these  defects  his  dramas  present  us  life  in  action; 
if  he  did  not  create  character,  he  was  a  natural 
master  in  the  depiction  of  types  and  the  presenta- 
tion of  backgrounds. 

His  plays  have  been  generally  grouped  as  (i)  por- 
traying life  in  the  country,  (2)  life  in  the  city,  es- 
pecially among  the  lower  middle  class,  and  (3)  pre- 
senting problems.     He  is  a  realist  first  of  all,  and 


SOUTH  AMERICA  227 

draws  chiefly  upon  persons  and  scenes  that  he  knows 
intimately.  Always  he  is  preoccupied  with  prob- 
lems that  life  has  suggested.  Now  {My  Son  the 
Doctor)  it  is  the  conflict  between  new  ideals  and 
old;  now  {La  Gringo)  the  conflict  between  the  native 
who  must  yield  up  his  holdings  to  the  more  indus- 
trious business-like  foreigner;  again,  as  in  Barranca 
Abajo^  or  En  Familia^  the  portrayal  of  a  family 
falling  away  to  moral  ruin  because  of  the  reverses 
that  overtake  them.  Himself  a  sick  man,  he  has  the 
courage  to  write  a  harsh  play  like  The  Rights  of 
Healthy  in  which  the  thesis  is  a  Nietzschean  disre- 
gard of  the  weak. 

Much  of  this  was  the  application  of  foreign  sug- 
gestion to  the  native  drama,  but  such  a  statement 
should  not  be  interpreted  as  implying  anything  Hke 
direct  imitation.  Sanchez  had  lived  and  seen  too 
much  to  need  such  aid.  On  the  other  hand,  intensely 
fond  of  the  stage,  he  could  not  help  being  influenced 
by  the  1904  season  in  Buenos  Aires  of  the  Italian 
actor,  Ermete  Zacconi,  and  the  plays  thus  revealed. 
There  are  external  resemblances  in  some  of  his 
plays  to  those  of  Bracco,  but  in  theme  only.  Of 
course  the  critics  had  to  talk  of  Ibsen,  as  if  Ibsen 
were  not  part  of  the  prevailing  atmosphere.  At  this 
time,  it  will  be  recalled,  Gorki  had  been  brought 
forward  by  the  Russian  revolution  of  1905. 

That  there  is  a  Grand  Guignol  element  in  San- 
chez is  shown  by  Antoine's  comment  after  witness- 
ing a  performance  of  M'hijo  el  dotor:  "It's  a  piece 
that  seems  to  have  been  written  for  my  theatre, 
with  an  admirable  sincerity  of  intention  and  sim- 
phcity  of  means.  I  almost  feel  like  giving  it  in  a 
translation  at  Paris." 


228        THE  DRAMA  OF  TRANSITION 

Yet,  even  allowing  for  these  varied  influences, 
Sanchez  is  Sanchez.  His  own  life  had  brought  him 
face  to  face  with  the  drink,  evil  that  he  studies  in 
Los  Miiertos;  his  own  experience  with  and  against 
the  police  had  brought  him  into  contact  with  the 
low  types  he  portrays  so  well  in  pieces  like  Moneda 
Falsa;  his  personal  health  could  have  suggested  the 
entire  pessimistic  facturc  of  his  plays,  though  it  has 
been  noted  that  whenever  he  looks  toward  the  com- 
ing day  he  is  optimistic.  Such,  for  example,  is  the 
end  of  [m  Crin^a^  where  the  son  of  a  foreigner  mar- 
ries the  daughter  of  the  conquered  native  and  pre- 
pares to  build  the  new  civilization  of  the  future. 
This  is  the  optimism  of  the  lyrical  anarchist  at 
battle  with  the  present;  it  is  the  optimism  of  a  con- 
sumptive Sanchez,  too — a  "spes  pthisica" — finding 
vent  in  his  work.  It  is  the  optimism  of  the  man  who, 
facing  a  lonely  death  in  Italy,  could  speak  of  his 
future  labors  with  the  accents  of  youthful  hope. 

Sanchez,  in  brief,  was  in  a  good  sense  of  the  term 
a  man  of  the  theatre.  P'aults  his  plays  reveal 
a-plenty:  in  My  Son  the  Doctor^  for  example,  the 
son,  who  supposedly  incarnates  the  new  ideas,  is 
far  below  the  father  who  exemplifies  the  old,  and  the 
woman  in  the  case  is  an  impossible  creature.  1  he 
plav,  because  of  its  historical  importance,  has  been 
much  overpraised  by  Spanish-American  critics  as  a 
work  of  art. 

It  has  been  estimated  that  the  actual  time  con- 
sumed in  the  writing  of  the  author's  entire  output 
was  thirty-five  to  forty  days.  Sanchez  died  at  the 
beginning  of  his  career.  His  plays,  though  they  are 
not  "literature,"  read  well,  even  compellingly. 
Time,  said  the  admirable  Brazilian  critic,  Verissimo, 


SOUTH  AMERICA  229 

does  not  respect  works  in  which  it  has  not  been 
made  a  collaborator.  Yet  it  might  be  answered,  on 
the  other  hand,  that  the  life  put  into  a  work  lives 
in  it.  And  though  Sanchez  did  not  make  Time  a 
collaborator,  he  had  a  faithful  ally  in  Life.  His 
plays  mirror  a  certain  progress  not  only  in  the  Ar- 
gentine drama,  but  in  life  itself  in  the  neighboring 
nations.  Belonging  thus  to  history  and  to  national 
development,  they  may  safely  hope  to  find  a  per- 
manent place  in  the  history  of  literature. 

It  is  inevitable  that,  in  the  criticism  of  such  works 
as  these,  the  moralistic  note  should  creep  in.  Of 
this,  the  best  example  with  reference  to  Sanchez,  is, 
I  believe,  the  one  hundred  and  thirty  odd  pages  of 
homiletic  futility  perpetrated  by  Carlos  Roxlo  in 
his  Historia  Critica  de  la  Literatura  Uruguay  a}  It 
is  not  worth  dwelling  upon.  The  drama  has  a  more 
beautiful  purpose  than  serving  as  a  text  for  ethical 
exhortation.  What  is  worth  dwelling  upon,  how- 
ever, is  the  other  danger  of  mistaking  the  drama- 
tist's views  for  dramatic  accomplishment — of  tak- 
ing the  drama  as  a  text  for  a  more  Hberal-minded 
exhortation,  but  exhortation  none  the  less,  which 
betrays  the  commentator  into  paths  of  philosophical 
polemics.  "Sanchez'  theatrical  works,"  writes 
Roxlo,  "whether  in  the  ideas  they  treat  or  in  their 
depiction  of  manners,  seem  to  me  a  mob  theatre, 
hardly  lofty  in  character  and  often  coarse  without 
need;  but  it  is  not  the  coarseness  of  a  Shakespeare, 

'  Uruguay,  one  of  the  smallest  of  nations,  has  in  this  huge  seven-volume  opus 
one  of  the  longest  of  literary  chronicles,  running  into  the  thousands  of  pages. 
Seflor  Roxlo  is  nothing  if  not  erudite,  and  is  capable  of  introducing  a  summary 
of  all  Greek  tragedy  as  a  prelude  to  the  discussion  of  the  innocent  Sanchez!  This 
is  a  morbid  example  of  the  pompousness  of  the  lesser  Spanish  and  Spanish-American 
critics;  it  reveals  the  self-proclamative  bombast  of  an  eminently  righteous  soul. 
The  chapters  on  Sdnchez  (Vol.  VI,  pages  297  to  433)  are  valuable  solely  for  the 
liberal  extracts  from  Sanchez'  plays,  which  the  author  uses  as  texts  for  his  windy 
sermons. 


230       THE  DRAMA  Ol-    I'RANSITION 

which  is  betimes  great,  rather  the  coarseness  that 
takes  me  back  to  the  circus  in  which,  with  their 
bilingual  gringos,  the  Podesta  brothers  got  their 
start."  Well  it  is  for  such  as  Roxlo  that  centuries 
of  commentators  intervened  between  him  and  Shake- 
speare. Otherwise,  should  we  not  have  him  declaim- 
ing upon  the  low  life  of  the  English  bard  and  tellinq 
him  that  life's  philosophies  arc  nor  formulated  in 
ale-houses,  even  as  he  says  of  the  author  of  M'/iijo 
el  dotor? 

Because  of  the  importance  of  this  play,  let  us 
pause  for  a  moment  upon  it,  as  upon  a  few  of  its 
fellows.  Sanchez*  dramatic  personality  will  be  the 
clearer  for  it. 

My  Son  the  Doctor ^  as  we  have  seen,  is  repre- 
sentative of  the  eternal  struggle  between  the  old 
and  the  new;  it  furnishes  the  turning  point  of  the 
Argentine  theatre  even  as  Hasenclever's  Der  So/ifi, 
with  its  similar  ideology,  provides  a  rallyini^-point 
for  the  young  German  Expressionists.  Julio  is 
here  the  rebellious  youth;  Mariquita  his  fond,  for- 
giving mother;  Olegario,  the  stern,  tyrannical  father. 
Jesusa,  loved  by  Eloy,  upon  whom  Julio  has  drawn 
a  forged  check  covered  by  Olegario,  is  attracted  to 
Julio  and  loves  him,  when  she  discovers  his  atten- 
tions to  Sarah.  The  situation  is  all  the  harder  since, 
as  might  be  expected,  she  is  on  the  way  to  mother- 
hood with  Julio's  child  beneath  her  heart.  The 
youthful  doctor  tries  to  justify  his  position  with  a 
iomewhat  preachy  speech  on  his  doctrine  of  moral 
non-responsibility.  Olegario  threatens  to  kill  his 
son  if  he  does  not  marry  the  seduced  woman.  Julio 
is  even  induced,  by  his  mother,  to  wed  the  girl,  and 
begins   to   behold   in    her  a   nobility   not   before   ap- 


SOUTH  AMERICA  231 

parent;  Jesusa,  however,  fears  that  he  will  go  back 
to  Sarah  after  all.  The  end  is  somewhat  indecisive, 
though  Julio  and  Jesusa  lead  Olegario  to  believe 
that  they  will  marry. 

There  can  be  no  doubting  the  notable  purpose  of 
the  drama;  but  the  ideas  suffer  through  insufficient 
and  not  wholly  convincing  characterization.  Just 
as  the  old  ideas  are  more  firmly  established  than 
the  new,  so  here  the  older  personages  seem  more 
real  than  the  young,  erratic  doctor.  Julio  himself 
does  not  show  a  real  understanding  of  the  free  no- 
tions he  professes.  At  best  he  is  a  transitory  figure 
who  has  glim^psed  a  new  truth,  but  has  sullied  it 
with  mistaking  freedom  for  irresponsibility.  This, 
however,  may  be  just  what  the  author  desired  to 
impress.  The  first  act  has  been  called  one  of  the 
great  moments  of  Argentine  drama;  the  other  two, 
however,  are  far  inferior.  The  play  as  a  whole  is 
important  rather  historically  than  as  an  example  of 
successful  artistic  creation.  It  has  been  elevated  to 
the  position  of  a  dramaturgic  idol;  Spanish-American 
critics  will,  as  a  group,  recede  from  this  untenable 
position  to  something  more  closely  approximating 
an  sesthetic  view. 

La  GringUy  of  the  following  year  (1904)  is  a  mirror 
of  the  transition  from  indigenous  to  cosmopolitan 
outlook.  Its  action  is  characteristically  swift — 
dramaturgic  stenography,  in  fact — and  up  to  the 
very  close  presents  a  fine  theme,  well-handled.  The 
most  convincing  character  is  the  old  Cantalicio,  as 
if  in  Sanchez  there  were  a  secret  sympathy  with, 
and  a  better  understanding  of,  the  older  regime, 
just  as,  despite  his  Nietzschean  Los  Derechos  de  la 
Salud^  he  was  himself  a  sick  man  and  kind  to  the 


232        THE  DRAMA  OF  TRANSITION 

weak,  and  oppressed.  In  La  Gritiga  no  sides  are 
taken;  the  foreign  "intruder"  and  the  native  are 
seen,  eventually,  to  merge  quite  as  naturally  as  the 
past  with  the  present.  A  similar  sense  of  situation, 
a  similar  human  insight  and  pathos  inform  Bar- 
ranca Abajo  (1905),  in  which  the  hardness  of  char- 
acter in  Zoilo  and  his  rebellious  daughter  and  his 
sister,  mirrors  the  rigidity  of  the  theme,  which 
recalls  Giacosa's  Come  le  Joglie.  What  this  play 
does  for  family  degeneration  in  the  country,  En 
Familia  (1905)  does  for  a  like  disintegration  in  the 
city.  Again  we  have  father  versus  son,  with 
the  son  at  the  same  time  winner  (morally)  and 
loser.  As  usual,  Sanchez  is  more  concerned  with 
dramatic  situation  than  with  psychology,  yet  he 
can  make  skillful  use  of  situation  to  throw  light 
upon  character.  He  studies  not  so  much  the  ruin 
of  a  family  as  the  results  of  that  ruin;  not  the 
process  hut  the  consequences. 

Los  Mueitos  (1905),  Sanchez'  fourth  play  for  that 
year,  is  more  than  simply  another  picture  of  a 
family's  dissolution  through  the  father's  vice  of 
drink.  Here  is  a  milieu  where  man's  beastliness  is 
enthroned  by  the  tenets  of  social  law  and  religious 
custom.  The  background  against  which  Lisandro 
stumbles  on  his  way  to  ruin  is  drawn  with  the 
effective,  broad  strokes  that  we  come  to  expect  of 
Sanchez.  But  what  seems  to  have  escaped  his 
critics  is  that  in  Amelia  we  have  one  of  the  rare 
women  rebels  in  Spanish-American  drama.  True, 
when  she  exchanges  Lisandro  for  Julian,  she  but 
exchanges  masters,  but  the  quest  for  happiness,  so 
long  thwarted  in  her,  at  least  finds  vent  in  one  mad 
dash   for  such   freedom   as  she  comprehends.     She 


SOUTH  AMERICA  233 

has  a  worthy,  if  more  understanding,  companion  in 
the  play  Liberia,  by  the  Cuban  dramatist  Jose 
Antonio  Ramos. 

Nuestros  Hijos  (1908)  is  important  for  its  plainly 
autobiographical  content;  it  is  yet  another  of  the 
plays  in  which  youth  and  age  wage  their  unending 
battle.  As  so  often  with  Sanchez,  and  most  other 
playwrights  engaged  upon  problems,  the  ideas  are 
more  important  than  the  personages  supposed  to 
represent  them,  though  here  the  motivation  is  con- 
scientious, even  if  but  sketchy.  The  economy  of 
words  is  telegraphic.  In  contrast  to  M'hijo  el 
dotor,  here  it  is  age  and  experience  which  see  farther 
and  more  resolutely  than  youth  and  its  facile  con- 
ventions. The  author  achieves  his  satire  of  the 
shallow,  charitable  soul  at  the  cost  of  exaggeration, 
yet  a  hot  sincerity  born  of  the  writer's  actual  ex- 
perience manages  to  fuse  these  touches  of  Ibsen, 
Bracco,  Giacosa,  and  lesser  social  dramatists  into 
something  like  a  personal  entity.  In  general  out- 
look the  piece  companions  Benavente's  Los  Mal- 
hechores  del  Bien,  while  in  the  figure  of  Mecha  it 
presents  another  of  the  rare  rebellious  women. 

Mecha,  seduced  and  deserted  by  Enrique,  scorns 
him,  though  she  would  marry  him  to  save  her  family 
anguish.  Her  father  is  a  queer,  liberal-social  spirit, 
seemingly  daft  upon  the  subject  of  illegitimate 
children.  Her  mother  and  sisters  "do  charity"  with 
the  automatism  of  most  superficial  dabblers  en- 
gaged in  that  work.  On  the  very  day  inaugurating 
the  campaign  in  behalf  of  abandoned  children  she 
reveals  her  condition  to  her  father.  Alfredo,  her 
brother,  fights  a  duel  with  Enrique,  but  neither  is 
hurt.     Mecha,  now  the  target  of  her  aunt's  moral 


234         THE  DRAMA  OF   TRANSITION 

arrows,  is  almost  convinced  to  go  to  a  convent. 
Her  father,  however,  stiffens  her  fibre.  She  no 
longer  loves  Enrique,  and  when  his  mother  comes 
with  his  offer  to  marry  her  after  all,  her  father 
refuses  in  her  name,  afterward  receiving  her  appro- 
bation. Mecha  has  now  her  brother's  insistence  to 
conquer,  and  this  she  does,  refusing  of  her  own  free 
will  to  wed  Enrique.  The  son  threatens  to  have  the 
marriage  consummated  by  force  and  (as  the  father 
has  foreseen)  to  have  their  obdurate  parent  shut 
up  as  insane.  At  the  height  of  the  argument  the 
father  lets  slip  a  word  about  his  wife's  infidelity;  he 
has  letters  as  proof.  .Alfredo  is  too  overwhelmed  to 
reconstruct  his  life,  but  father,  daughter,  and  un- 
born child  go  forward  to  a  new  day,  a  new  life  built 
upon  their  own  truths. 

It  is  the  last  of  Sanchez'  imj^ortant  plays,  Los 
Derechos  de  la  Salud  {The  Rights  of  Health)^  1908, 
that  has  long  been  the  topic  of  excited  comment. 
It  provides  excellent  fare  for  such  critics  as  Roxlo, 
treating,  as  it  does,  so  revolutionary  a  theme  as  the 
right  of  health  to  love,  even  if  the  weak  must  suffer. 
It  helps  to  reveal  the  difference  between  such 
critics  as  Echagiie  and  Bianchi.  Where  the  former 
finds  only  gloom,  unreality,  and  false  psychology, 
the  latter  (erring,  in  my  opinion,  toward  the  oppo- 
site extreme)  discovers  a  play  which,  if  it  had  been 
produced  originally  in  French,  would  have  estab- 
lished its  author's  reputation  instead  of  proving,  as 
it  did,  a  failure  in  Buenos  Aires.  The  truth,  as  so 
often,  lies  in  the  middle.  Los  Derechos  de  la  Salud 
is  a  compelling,  cruel  play  in  which  the  hardness  of 
the  thesis  appears  in  a  certain  hardness  of  the  char- 
acters who  exemplify  it.     It  contains  more  than  a 


SOUTH  AMERICA  235 

touch  of  melodrama  and  more  than  one  artificial 
situation.  Nor  is  it  so  convincing  as  some  of  the 
other  dramas  in  which  Sanchez  treats  of  principles 
and  problems.  But  its  cruelty  is  part  of  the  inherent 
cruelty  of  nature,  and,  as  in  so  much  of  what  Sanchez 
has  written,  there  is  a  singular  appeal  born  of  pas- 
sionate intensity  that  vivifies  the  crudeness. 

It  was  natural  that  the  very  title  of  the  play,  as 
well  as  the  projected  piece  Derecho  a  la  tristeza  {The 
Right  to  Sad?7ess)  should  bring  to  the  mind  of  critics 
the  play  by  Roberto  Bracco  called  //  diritto  di 
vivere  {The  Right  to  Live).  It  is  recalled,  too,  in 
this  connection,  that  Sanchez,  like  Bracco,  received 
his  initiation  into  adult  life  by  way  of  the  poHce 
court.  But  Giusti  is  right  in  checking  the  com- 
parison right  there.  "He  lacks  Bracco's  grace,  his 
sparkling,  ingenious  dialogue;  he  lacked  (nor  is  this 
to  be  deplored)  the  subtlety  that  so  often  converts 
the  great  Italian  dramatist  into  an  extravagant 
casuist.  .  .  .  By  that  same  token  Sanchez  is 
more  genuine.  Wherefore  every  one  of  his  works 
is  a  valuable  document  of  a  psychology  and  a  soci- 
ology that  are  eminently  true  to  our  life.  Because 
of  them,  if  we  consider  their  human  content  and 
their  rich  originality,  Sanchez  is  superior  to  many 
celebrated  foreigners,  mediocrities  who  conceal  be- 
neath a  gracious,  refined  art  their  feeble  conception 
and  their  superficial  observation."^ 

The  play  itself  is  characteristically  brief:  some 
less  than  sixty  pages  of  ordinary  print.  Luisa  is  a 
consumptive,  the  wife  of  Roberto;  he  is  slowly  fall- 
ing in  love  with  his  sister-in-law,  Renata.  Luisa, 
with   the  perspicaciousness  of  illness,  suspects  her 

'  Florencio  Sanchez,  page  96. 


236        THK  DRAMA  OF  TRANSITION 

sister;  Renata,  learning  of  this,  decides  to  leave  the 
home — in  which  she  serves  as  Roberto's  amanu- 
ensis,— but  Roberto  is  beside  himself  at  the  news. 
The  wife,  piqued  at  this  practical  demonstration  of 
affection  for  the  woman  who  loved  him  before 
she  herself  did,  tries  to  reach  a  revolver  locked  in 
Roberto's  drawer.  Her  death,  in  any  event  inev- 
itable, is  hastened  bv  the  domestic  imbroglio. 
Roberto,  who  is  a  writer,  and  who  pities  his  wife 
deeply,  defends  the  right  of  health  to  the  happiness 
that  illness  cannot  provide  for  it.  The  end  is  fore- 
seen; Luisa  will  die;  Renata  and  Roberto  will  marry. 

There  is  something  in  Sanchez  that,  to  an  Amer- 
ican of  the  North,  suggests  a  fleeting  comparison  with 
Eugene  O'Neill.  Like  Sanchez,  O'Neill  has  brought 
to  a  stage  infested  with  unrealities  a  breath  of  the 
everlasting  that  informs  all  reality.  To  speak  in 
text-book  terminology,  part  of  O'N^eill's  work  rep- 
resents, upon  our  stage,  the  belated  arrival  of 
European  realism.  But  Sanchez  stopped  writing 
four  years  before  the  war  began;  O'Neill  began  writ- 
ing in  the  year  of  the  war  and  lived  through  those 
horrible  years.  He  has  learned,  and  quickly,  what 
Sanchez  would  have  learned  with  equal  rapidity: 
that  narrow  realism  is  not  enough.  Wherefore  he 
abandons  his  early  melodrama  for  a  more  plastic 
medium,  thus  bridging,  within  the  space  of  a 
few  years,  several  distinct  epochs  in  the  evolution 
of  dramatic  form.  In  O'Neill,  as  in  Sanchez,  there 
is  a  certain  stenographic  quality  born  of  a  multi- 
farious, restless  life;  in  the  North  American,  as  in 
the  American  of  the  South,  there  is  the  same  suc- 
cinctness, the  same  sketchy  psychology,  the  same 


SOUTH  AMERICA  237 

raciness  of  dialogue  and  nearness  to  the  soil,  the 
same  lack  of  "literary"  graces — as  if  "literature" 
and  "style,"  rather  than  extraneous  ingredients  that 
may  be  mixed  into  a  work,  were  not  organic  com- 
ponents of  the  creative  entity!  In  each,  action  is 
more  important  than  lengthy  speech;  O'Neill,  the 
equal  of  Sanchez  in  reproduction  of  ambient,  is  his 
superior  in  dramatic  projection  of  character.  Our 
own  writer  is  one  of  the  hopes  of  the  native  drama; 
Sanchez  is,  thus  far,  the  chief  dramatic  glory  of  his 
continent.  That  glory,  as  we  have  seen,  rests  upon 
his  personality,  his  importance  to  his  epoch,  as 
much  as  upon  the  plays  produced  by  this  errant, 
human,  striving  child  of  the  early  twentieth  cen- 
tury. Yet  one  would  gladly  surrender  many  a 
work  by  such  "famous"  playwrights  as  Bernstein, 
the  later  Brieux,  the  later  Echegaray,  and  a  number 
of  the  European  mediocrities,  for  the  crude  life  that 
pulses  in  the  dramatic  output  of  Florencio  Sanchez. 
Passionate  sincerity  is  not  enough  to  create  a  work 
of  art;  it  is  always  to  be  preferred,  however,  to  that 
passionless  excellence  of  the  artificer  who  has  noth- 
ing to  give  because  he  garnered  nothing.  Others 
to  come  will  go  farther  than  Sanchez,  but  they  will 
be  the  stronger  for  his  having  labored. 

JOSE  ANTONIO  RAMOS 

If  I  now  take  up  the  work  of  a  semi-obscure 
Cuban  who  has  spent  much  of  his  life  in  the  dip- 
lomatic service  of  his  country,  who  has  contributed 
too  much  of  his  strength  to  political  turmoil,  and 
has  had  to  rob  the  very  time  in  which  his  dramas 
have  been  written,  it  is  as  much  to  pay  tribute  to 
the  man  as  to  his  work,  and  to  give  some  notion  of 


238        TME  DRAMA  OF  TRANsniUN 

the  difficulties  under  which  dramatic  authorship  es- 
pecially labors  in  the  various  countries  of  Spanish 
America.  It  is  doubtful  whether  the  drama  exists 
today  in  Colombia,  Cuba,  or,  for  that  matter, 
Brazil.  There  are  theatres,  of  course;  there  is  a 
social  audience;  but  there  is  not  that  highly  or- 
ganized, concentrated  body  of  playgoers  that  is  at 
once  inspiration  and  goal.  The  younger  play- 
wrights are  too  ready  to  let  second  or  third  best  fill 
the  place  of  their  highest  efforts;  log-rolling  and 
facile  interchange  n(  meaningless  praise  is  the  rule 
rather  than  the  exception;  ideas  are  not  digested, 
they  are  seized  upon  as  so  inuch  grist  for  the  the- 
atrical mill.  The  result  is  that  thesis-pieces  abound; 
they  are  an  easy  substitute  for  the  oratory,  the 
rhetoric,  the  exhibitionism  that  come  too  easy  to 
the  Latin  youth.  On  the  other  hand,  the  social 
problems  presented  by  the  shifting  scene  are  many, 
and  the  dramatist — a  human  being  after  all,  ea^^er 
to  lift  his  nation  to  a  place  of  eminence — attacks 
these  through  the  play  as  through  the  speech  or  the 
press.  It  is  next  to  impossible  to  produce  great 
literature  under  such  circumstances;  merely  to  fol- 
low the  literary  career  represents  a  physical,  a  moral 
triumph.  Yet  the  artist  must  write,  and  if  players 
are  not  found  for  his  work,  he  is  not  discouraged; 
he  prints  it,  usually  at  his  own  expense.  So  doing, 
and  in  the  absence  of  the  actors,  he  runs  the  risk 
of  producing  "literary"  drama,  "not  for  the  stage"; 
but  there  are  other  dangers  that  he  may  steer  clear 
of,  notably  that  same  stage  and  those  same  actors. 
The  theatre  is  a  social  institution;  the  drama,  an 
individual. 

"You    resign    yourself    to   pulilishingr    this    work," 


SOUTH  AMERICA  239 

wrote  Benavente  to  Senor  Ramos,  with  reference  to 
the  Cuban's  play  Liberia^  "certain  that  you  will 
find  neither  managers  nor  actors  who  dare  to  pre- 
sent it.  You  know  that  not  all  that  is  of  the  theatre 
is  art,  and  vice-versa.  You  know  that  the  public 
assembled  in  a  theatre  flaunts  a  morality  that  may 
be  taken  off  like  a  garment  and  again  put  on.  .  .  . 
If  I  were  a  manager,  I  would  produce  your  work; 
and  if  I  were  a  theatre-goer  I'd  be  more  interested 
to  witness  it  than  some  play  like  Maitre  des  Forges^ 
Fedora^  or  Madame  Sans-Gene.  But  you  may  take 
my  word  for  it  that,  for  my  part,  I  lose  nothing  by 
reading  it  and  perhaps  gain  by  avoiding  a  produc- 
tion given  by  a  bad  company. ^ 

"Your  play  is  a  work  of  art  and  it  is  something 
more.  Something  more,  what  though  the  partisans 
of  art  for  art's  sake  may  think  different.  ...  I 
must  confess  that  as  regards  free  love  I  have  my 
own  opinions;  there  is  no  need  of  expounding  them 
here.  We  all  are  free  to  love  when  and  wherever 
love  summons  us.  But  what  I  don't  believe  is  that 
we  should  be  free  not  to  accept  the  consequences, 
the  duties,  that  such  liberty  imposes. 

"The  most  interesting  part  of  your  work  seems  to 
me  the  situation  of  the  heroine  after  her  first  lapse, 
when  everybody  denies  her  the  right  to  a  new  love 
and  would  prefer  to  have  her  consume  her  life  in 
dolorous  expiatory  penance. 

"But,  you  know  it  as  well  as  I;  if  you  wish  to  be 
a  popular  author,  don't  look  for  plays  in  life;  thumb 
over  the  theatrical  archives  and  be  one  of  the  reg- 
ular gang. 

1  This  view  is  interesting,  as  coming  from  a  higlily  successful  playwright.  It 
is  almost  a  restatement  of  the  quotation  from  Charles  Lamb  in  the  opening  chapter 
of  this  book,  and  provides  an  argument  for  the  opponents  of  the  Castelvetro 
doctrine  that  a  play  is  not  a  play  until  it  has  seen  actual  performance. 


240        THE  DRAMA  OF  TRANSITION 

"If  you  wish  to  be  .  .  .  yourself.  Ah!  Then 
compromise  a  bit,  for  in  Art  one  must  be  an  oppor- 
tunist, as  in  politics,  as  in  all  things.  .  .  .  Deceiv- 
ing is  not  the  same  as  treason." 

The  letter,  especially  toward  the  end,  throws 
light  upon  one  source  of  Benavente's  own  short- 
comings in  the  drama.  But  it  reveals  him  here  as  a 
ready  friend  of  promising  youth.  With  similar 
sympathy  he  has  studied  the  stage  in  Argentina. 

Ramos'  Liberia  is  denominated  by  the  author  a 
scenic  novel  in  four  acts.  It  is  not  the  swirling  stage 
kaleidoscope  that  Benavente's  similarly  named 
pieces  are,  resembling  rather  the  Galdosian  applica- 
tion of  the  novel  technique  to  the  stage.  Mercedes 
is  to  become  the  mother  of  a  child  by  Luis,  who  is 
leaving  for  a  career,  with  the  promise  to  return  and 
claim  her.  Elvira,  her  elder  sister,  has  a  talk  with 
Luis,  threatens  to  tell  Don  Justo,  her  father,  but  is 
prevented.  Mercedes'  perturbation  is  taken  by  the 
parents  for  girlish  hysteria,  and  she  is  not  permitted 
to  accompany  her  sweetheart  to  the  wharf.  Three 
years  go  by.  Mercedes'  lover  has  not  returned  and 
she  has  been  in  disgrace  and  in  seclusion  with  her 
child.  But  she  has  learned  rebellion,  and  far  from 
giving  herself  up  to  repentant  resignation,  she  for- 
gets her  unworthy  lover  and  exercises  her  right  to 
find  happiness  in  another,  Arturo.  Her  father  dis- 
covers this;  there  is  a  scene  in  which  his  old  ideas 
and  her  new  ones  are  contrasted;  he  demands  that 
she  change  her  place  for  a  more  secluded  one  on  the 
floor  below;  she  refuses,  and  prefers  to  be  cast  into 
the  streets.  Arturo,  overhearing  her  declaration  of 
love  for  him,  climbs  back  to  the  balcony  to  her. 
Six   years   after  his  disappearance,   Luis,   semi-con- 


SOUTH  AMERICA  241 

trite,  returns  to  see  his  child.  Mercedes'  mother  is 
eager  for  "rehabilitation";  so  are  the  others,  but 
Mercedes  has  found  a  fiercely  loved  freedom  through 
all  her  suffering.  She  really  cares  for  Arturo,  though 
she  sees  that  he,  too,  is  an  egotist.  Four  more  years 
go  by  in  the  scenic  novel.  Mercedes  has  had  a 
varied  experience  among  different  men  of  her  choos- 
ing. Again  she  is  visited  by  Luis,  who  is  married 
and  has  a  child.  She  plays  cruelly  with  him,  forcing 
from  him  a  confession  of  man's  sexual  egotism,  re- 
fusing to  flee  with  him,  inciting  him  to  ardor,  and 
finally  consenting  to  remain  with  him  for  the  night 
in  "sexual  friendship."  This,  it  seems,  is  the  lesson 
of  sexual  freedom  that  she  has  learned  and  taught 
him. 

The  writing  is  clear,  swift,  natural;  the  characters 
really  live,  if  at  times  they  do  too  plainly  voice  the 
author's  pros  and  contras;  the  drama  has  grown  out 
of  an  inner  attitude.  And  something  of  the  hazi- 
ness of  the  attitude  contrives  to  wrap  the  personages 
in  a  similar  haze.  The  evolution  of  Mercedes  from 
the  "clinging  vine"  type  to  a  master  of  men  shows 
a  gap  at  the  one  place  in  which  we  are  most  inter- 
ested; the  period  between  Luis'  desertion  and  the 
advent  of  her  rebellious  spirit.  Luis'  conversion  at 
the  end  is  suspiciously  sudden.  Some  might  ask 
whether  Mercedes  could  or  would  justify  herself  in 
taking  Luis  away  from  his  family.  Persons  who 
think  their  way  to  freedom  are  not  wont  to  exercise 
it  in  such  a  fashion,  especially  after  years  have 
matured  their  beliefs.  Yet  there  is  a  basis  of  depth 
in  Mercedes'  character.  The  spirit  of  Ibsen  and  of 
the  Italian  Bracco  strive  somewhat  murkily  in  this 


242        THK  DRAMA  OF  TRANsniON 

lone   Cuban   woman.     And    Ramos,   her  creator,   is 
just  as  lonely  in  Cuba  as  is  she. 

Peculiarly  enough,  he  is  not  quite  so  successful 
in  his  patriotic  plays,  perhaps  because  of  a  political 
eagerness  to  impose  rather  than  elucidate  and  vivify 
an  attitude.  Only  the  evident  sincerity  (.ii  El  1 1  ombre 
Fiierte  {The  Strong  Man,  191 5,)  saves  it  from  the 
fate  of  melodrama.  As  it  is,  the  same  patriotic 
symbolism  that  pervades  Temhladera,  likewise  a 
drama  in  three  acts,  obscures  the  effect,  though 
never  descending  to  the  ineptitude  of  the  one-act 
piece,  The  Traitor,  which  is  as  bad  as  our  own 
Mackaye's  Sam  Average  and  for  precisely  the  same 
reasons.  El  Homhre  Fuerte  seeks  to  represent  the 
triumph  of  spirit  over  brute  force,  with  Elena 
(standing,  perhaps  for  Cuba)  as  the  pawn.  Ramos 
understands  readily  enough  the  craft  of  the  stage, 
yet  the  play  as  a  whole  is  of  gradually  declining 
interest  and  presents  a  thesis  worked  out  in  ar- 
bitrary fashion.  Tembladera  is  better;  it  may  be 
enjoyed  without  reference  to  the  patriotic  sym- 
bolism, and  merges  his  favorite  themes, — woman, 
Cuba,  progress,  justice,  humanity — into  a  highly 
readable,  actable  work. 

None  better  than  Ramos  appreciates  his  short- 
comings and  the  external  as  well  as  inner  reasons  for 
them.  In  his  interesting  foreword  to  Tembladera,  he 
argues  for  a  Cuban  literature  and  a  Cuban  crit- 
icism— for  a  national  personality.  He  advances  the 
arresting  idea  that,  far  from  having  gone  through 
its  period  of  Romanticism,  Cuba,  like  the  rest  of 
Latin  America,  has  yet  to  experience  it;  this  time, 
not  as  the  mere  echo  of  a  European  outburst,  but 


SOUTH  AMERICA  243 

as    a    manifestation    of    national    and    continental 
selfhood. 

BRAZIL:  CLAUDIO  DE  SOUZA 

The  history  of  the  Brazilian  theatre,  despite 
Sylvio  Romero's  effort  to  divide  it  into  no  less  than 
eight  distinct  "periods,"  is  hardly  of  great  conse- 
quence.^ Many  plays  can  no  doubt  be  assembled; 
I  question  whether  some  of  them  even  belong  to 
Brazilian  literature,  as,  for  example,  those  of  the 
famous  Jew  (0  Jiideu^  his  contemporaries  called 
him)  Antonio  Jose  da  Silva,  who  was  Brazilian  only 
by  birth,  and  died  in  early  manhood  at  the  hands 
of  the  Portuguese  Inquisitors.  Our  only  interest 
in  the  Brazilian  theatre  is  to  discover  what  its  prac- 
titioners are  doing  to-day;  this  we  may  glimpse  in 
the  work  of  the  most  popular  of  the  dramatists, 
Claudio  de  Souza,  author  not  only  of  some  highly 
successful  stage  pieces,  but  of  works  upon  pathol- 
ogy and  social  hygiene. 

The  most  popular  of  his  pieces  is  the  three-act 
Flores  de  Sombra^  which  reached  the  rare  number  of 
three  hundred  performances — a  figure  that  is  quite 
as  commercially  respectable  in  New  York  as  in 
Rio  de  Janeiro  or  Sao  Paulo.    It  dates  back  to  1916. 

It  is  easy  to  see  the  reason  for  the  popularity, 
though  such  critical  wisdom  after  the  fact  should 
not  deceive  us  into  excessive  confidence.  In  the 
first  place,  it  upholds  the  good  old  times,  as  repre- 
sented in  the  mother  of  the  jeune  premier.     It  pre- 

'  In  Senhor  H.  Marino's  0  Theatro  Brasileiro  (Rio  de  Janeiro,  1904),  to  which 
Romero  contributes  a  short  introduction,  the  student  will  find  precious  little 
about  the  drama  of  Brazil.  He  can  well  dispense  with  it  until  something  more 
substantial  appears.  Romero,  as  students  of  Brazilian  literature  are  aware  from 
his  thick  tomes  upon  the  national  letters,  dearly  loved  to  catalogue  by  periods, 
and  changed  around  from  one  set  of  periods  to  another. 


244       THE  DRAMA  OF  TRANSITION 

sents,  as  companion  of  this  prodigal  son,  a  French- 
ified dandy  with  a  vagabond's  philosophy  of  the 
world,  a  winning  way  with  the  ladies,  and,  in  the 
end,  a  heart  far  softer  than  the  rapier  edge  of  his 
tongue.  There  is  much  playing  with  frilled  sug- 
gestiveness.  The  sweetheart  of  country  days  is, 
for  the  nonce,  vanquished  by  an  adventuress  from 
the  city.  The  son,  forgetting  his  better  self,  is  about 
to  talk  marriage  to  her  when  his  sharp-tongued, 
modernist  chum  wins  her  away  from  him.  Treach- 
ery? Betrayal  of  friendship?  So  we  imagine,  until 
in  the  end  he  confesses  that  he  had  no  intention  of 
marrying  the  lady.  He  merely  wished  to  save  his 
friend,  who  is  true  to  his  mother,  to  the  country 
sweetheart,  and  to  the  past  after  all.  For  he  marries 
the  modest  flower  of  his  childhood  days  antl  all  is 
well.  Even  the  servants,  as  per  prescribed  formula, 
make  up  their  parallel  differences,  and  Bless  You, 
My  Children,  is  the  word  for  all. 

Among  the  latest  of  his  plays  is  .</  Jangaday  bear- 
ing the  symbolic  title  of  the  raft,  or  the  mutual 
support  of  two  stray  logs  dashed  together  by  the 
rush  of  the  torrent.  Coelho  Netto,  himself  one  of 
the  more  prominent  of  latter-day  Brazilian  drama- 
tists, has  praised  it  with  all  the  weight  that  derives 
from  membership  in  the  national  academy  of  letters. 
Claudio  de  Souza,  he  has  written,  is  to-day,  "incon- 
tcstibly,  our  chief  playwright.  .  .  .  His  pieces 
run  along  smoothly,  naturally,  without  the  slightest 
effort,  which  proves  his  technical  knowledge;  in 
them,  moreover,  all  the  personages  are  of  our  own 
ambient,  the  milieu  is  ours,  the  speech. 
Claudio  de  Souza  creates  a  worthy  theatre  because 


SOUTH  AMERICA  245 

he  makes  it  Brazilian,  not  alone  in  the  plots  but  in 
the  roles;  in  the  scene    as  well  as  the  sentiment." 

Which,  with  all  due  deference  to  Coelho  Netto's 
remarkable  powers  as  an  opulent  writer  of  tales, 
is  but  a  quarter  true.  The  dramatist's  Brazilianism 
we  will  not  question;  his  plots,  however,  are  no  more 
of  Brazil  than  of  New  York.  Sanchez,  for  example, 
wishing  to  contrast  the  notions  of  the  old  genera- 
tion and  the  new,  writes  a  genuine  play  in  M'hijo 
el  dotor^  propelled,  despite  its  faults,  by  the  inner 
sincerity  that  engendered  it.  It  is  far  different  with 
Claudio  de  Souza's  Flores  de  Sombra.  His  people 
are  mere  stage  figures;  they  come  on  and  off  at  the 
wire-pulling  of  the  author;  they  say  what  he  wishes 
them  to,  and  when;  they  are  the  arbitrary  puppets 
of  his  purpose.  They  do  things  that  hundreds  of 
similar  puppets  perform  on  the  stage  of  a  score  of 
nations;  they  are  the  lines  of  the  author's  text. 

Similarly,  when  another  critic  praises  the  psy- 
chology of  the  leading  pair  in  A  Jangada^  he  in- 
dulges in  the  amenities  of  social  compliments — a 
weakness  long  inherent  in  the  Portuguese  on  both 
sides  of  the  Atlantic.  The  truth  is  that  Claudio  de 
Souza  has  themes,  but  not  dramatic  imagination. 
In  A  Jangada^  certainly,  he  gets  nearer  to  the  core 
of  his  theme,  but  he  is  unable  or  unwilling  to  aban- 
don the  easy  aid  of  "comic  relief,"  cheap  punning, 
very  obvious  scenes  cLfaire^  and  such  ancient  devices. 
In  La  Petite  et  le  Grand  (I  know  only  the  transla- 
tion into  French)  he  is  capable  of  a  war  dialogue 
on  the  theme  of  Belgium  and  Germany  that  is 
every  bit  as  bad  as  Harold  Brighouse's  Maid  of 
France. 


246        'IHh  DRAMA  OF  TRANsri'ION 

In  the  conventional  sense,  Claudio  de  Souza  is  a 
good  enough  manufacturer  of  phiys;  he  has  intu- 
itions of  life's  beauties;  undoubtedly  he  feels  the  stir 
of  social  purpose.  But  he  does  not  lift  the  Brazilian 
stage  to  the  level  of  dramatic  artistry,  and  only  in 
isolated  instances,  thus  far,  does  he  seem  to  grasp 
that  higher  conception.  His  critics  have,  wittingly 
or  unwirtinglv,  praised  his  purpose  rather  than  his 
accomplishment. 


FRANCE 


FRANCE 

A  NOTE  ON  ROMAIN  ROLLAND,  PLAY- 
WRIGHT 

The  danger  common  to  all  movements  for  bring- 
ing art  to  the  masses  is  that  the  artist,  in  his  attempt 
to  "elevate"  his  audience,  will  descend  to  the  level 
of  the  common  denominator  of  that  audience.  He 
will,  in  a  word,  become  less  the  artist  as  he  succeeds 
in  a  conscious  generalization  of  his  power.  It  is  one 
thing  to  bring  art  to  the  masses  and  another  to 
write  for  the  masses  an  art  designed  particularly  for 
their  tastes.  Economic  sympathies  aside,  the  masses, 
as  such,  are  inimical  to  art — more  inimical,  per- 
haps, than  the  static  bourgeoisie.  Leisure  confers 
opportunity  to  cultivate  taste;  excessive  labor  at 
minimum  wages  robs  the  worker  of  that  oppor- 
tunity. The  proletariat,  as  proletariat,  is  artistically 
inarticulate,  and  even  its  leaders,  its  Marxes,  Engels, 
Kautskys,  come  from  the  despised  bourgeoisie. 
This  is  not  to  say  that  its  ranks  do  not  contain 
gifted  spirits,  intellectual  aristocrats,  if  you  will, 
just  as  the  ranks  of  the  economic  aristocrats  teem 
with  companies  of  intellectual  laggards  and  ma- 
ligners.  But  it  is  an  error,  and  a  serious  one,  to 
mistake  sympathy  with  the  plight  of  the  down- 
trodden for  the  justification  of  lowering  one's  ar- 
tistic standards  by  an  inch  in  an  effort  to  "bring 
art"  to  those  downtrodden.  It  is  significant  that 
the  more  enlightened  of  the  workers'  leaders  are  as 

249 


250        THK  DRAMA  ()l<  TRANSITION 

vociferous  in  their  objection  to  literary  propaganda 
as  is  any  upholder  of  the  strictest  artistic  indi- 
viduality. 

This,  then,  is  not  to  say  that  the  proletariat,  as  a 
subject  of  art,  possesses  no  tragic  beauty;  it  is  not 
to  say  that  their  condition  of  economic  servitude 
adds  to  their  numerous  burdens  an  arbitrary  ex- 
clusion from  the  realms  of  the  beautiful.  But  it  is, 
however,  meant  as  a  protest  against  some  of  the 
implications  contained  in  such  theories  as  Rolland's 
theatre  of  the  people. 

"The  summons  was  two-fold,"  writes  Zweig,  in 
his  panegyric  of  Rolland,  discussing  the  vicissitudes 
ot  Rolland's  popular  theatre,  "to  the  writers  and 
to  the  people,  that  they  should  constitute  a  new 
unity,  should  form  a  people's  theatre.  Since  the 
forces  ot  the  people  are  eternal  and  unalterable,  art 
must  accommodate  itself  to  the  people,  not  the 
people  to  art."' 

Here,  in  so  many  words,  is  precisely  the  notion 
that  vitiates  so  much  of  Rolland's  theatre  and  that 
I  have  been  trying  in  the  opening  paragraphs  to 
oppose.  It  is  not  a  question  of  Rolland's  idealism 
or  the  undoubted  nobility  of  the  man.  As  an  in- 
tellectual force,  however  one  may  regard  his  views, 
he  is  one  of  the  outstanding  personalities  of  our 
time.  "Valueless  also,  in  Rolland's  view,"  con- 
tinues Zweig's  interpretation,*  "are  the  attempts 
made  from  time  to  time  by  the  Comedie  Fran^aise 

'  Romain  RoHand,  the  Man  and  His  Work.  By  Stefan  Zweig.  Translated 
from  the  original  manuscript  by  Eden  and  Cedar  Paul,  Ne«  Vort.  1921.  This 
book  contains  an  excellent  bibliography,  including  translations  into  various  tongues. 
As  a  work  of  biography  it  is  high-flown,  poetic,  eminently  readable;  it  converts 
Rolland,  however,  into  a  hero  of  predestined  glory,  an  epic  intellectual,  a  moral 
king  who  can  do  no  wTong.  It  is  the  work  of  a  disciple,  a  eulogist,  rather  than 
of  a  critic.     Page  90  et  seq. 

•  Mr.  Barrett  H.  Clark  has  translated,  in  addition  to  Rolland's  plays,  Tht 
Fourteenth  of  July  and  Danlon,  the  same  author's  Theatre  of  the  People,  New  York. 


FRANCE  251 

to  present  to  the  workers  the  plays  of  such  court 
poets  as  Corneille  and  Racine.  The  people  do  not 
want  caviare,  but  wholesome  fare.  For  the  nourish- 
ment of  their  indestructible  idealism  they  need  an 
art  of  their  own,  a  theatre  of  their  own,  and  above 
all,  works  adapted  to  their  sensibilities.  When  thev 
come  to  the  theatre,  they  must  not  be  made  to  feel 
that  they  are  tolerated  guests  in  a  world  of  unfa- 
miliar ideas.  In  the  art  that  is  presented  to  them 
they  must  be  able  to  recognize  the  mainspring  of 
their  own  energies." 

Again,  a  dangerous  and  debasing  view,  over- 
idealizing  the  "people"  and  what  is  more,  cramping 
the  artist  at  the  outset.  The  very  member  of  the 
masses  whom,  unconsciously,  Rolland  was  striving 
for,  had  already  reached  a  sterner  and  purer  concep- 
tion of  the  dramatic  art.  Rightly  was  Rolland  fired 
by  Goethe's  literary  internationalism,  but  in  using 
the  German's  words  as  a  clarion-call  to  the  forma- 
tion of  a  popular  art,  he  but  exchanged  the  restric- 
tions of  nation  for  those  of  semi-articulate  ignorance. 
The  way  to  art  does  not  lie  in  that  direction.  If  the 
masses  are  to  be  "saved,"  truckling  to  their  aesthetic 
insufficiency  will  not  do  it;  and  the  first  to  inform 
Mr.  Rolland  of  this  vital  fact  would  be  the  artis- 
tically emancipated  worker  himself.  He  does  not 
want  to  be  "saved."  He  comes,  sooner  or  later,  to 
the  realization  that  art  is  fundamentally  human, 
with  its  roots  in  the  common  life  that  is  our  heritage 
as  creatures  of  the  earth,  but  with  its  flowers  in 
personality.  He  who  writes  plays  "for  the  masses" 
but  repeats,  on  a  larger  scale,  the  error  of  the  mere 
technicians  with  their  wise  gabble  about  the  "psy- 
chology of  the  crowd."     Of  course  there  is  a  psy- 


252        THE  DRAMA  OV    TRANSITION 

chology  of  large  assemblages — the  mere  contagion 
of  numbers;  so,  too,  is  there  a  psychology  ot  the 
masses.  But  do  artists  write  for  numbers?  Do  not 
the  individuals  of  those  very  numbers,  once  they 
have  come  to  an  appreciation  ot  art,  rctute  the  whole 
"mass-art"  idea  in  their  very  search  tor  the  world's 
salient  minds  and  works?  To-day,  yesterday,  to- 
morrow— art  is  in  essence  of  the  intellectual  aris- 
tocracy; it  may  be  colored,  inspired  by  mass  prob- 
lems, mass  aspirations;  in  such  a  sense,  art  of  the 
masses  may  exist  and  docs.  Hut  art /or  the  masses, 
art  consciously  directed  by  mass  problems,  is  a 
simple  self-negation.  Art  may  pass  through  many 
mediums,  but  it  begins  and  ends,  as  we  have  already 
said,  in  the  individual. 

And  this  is  true,  even  of  Rolland's  theatrical  art. 
That  same  longing  tor  vast  canvases,  that  led  hiin 
to  project  his  works  not  in  books  but  in  series, 
reaches  out  to  the  vastness  of  the  people  and  the 
vastness  of  the  stage  that  he  has  projected  for  them. 
His  internationality  is  the  philosophic  aspect  of  this 
craving.  Nor  are  his  plays  always  the  evil  fulfill- 
ment of  his  theories.  .A  large  simplicity  they  attain; 
Rolland,  too,  in  his  own  way,  telt  the  need  of  get- 
ting the  audience  to  join  the  actors,  of  bridging  the 
gap  that  yawns  between  stage  and  auditorium. 
Thus,  in  his  note  to  the  final  scene  of  Le  14  Juillet 
he  writes  that  the  public  is  to  join  in  the  singing 
and  the  dancing  of  the  celebration.  He  calls  for 
the  public  to  "mingle  not  only  its  thought  but  its 
voice  with  the  action;  the  People  itself  becoming 
an  actor  in  the  People's  fete."  He  would  have  as 
music  the  famous  Ninth  Symphony  chorus  of 
Beethoven,  or  something  similarly  inspired  by  rev- 


FRANCE  253 

olutionary  spirit;  he  underlines  his  desire  to  have 
choruses  distributed  in  every  part  of  the  theatre,  or 
even  miniature  orchestras,  framing  the  public  and 
"compelling  it  by  sheer  moral  force  to  sing  with 
them.  If  this  public  is  composed,  even  in  part,  of 
members  of  the  common  people  and  of  young  folk 
who  feel  personally  the  passions  of  the  Revolution, 
I  can  answer  for  their  taking  up  the  strains." 

Thus,  Rolland's  plays  may  have  failed  in  their 
primary  purpose,  which  was  in  theory  antagonistic 
to  the  life  of  art,  but  they  are  not  without  their 
suggestiveness  to  the  creative  dramatist,  nor  can  it 
be  said  that  they  are  totally  without  effect  in  actual 
production,  as  recent  performances  of  Danion  in 
Germany  have  shown.  The  latest  of  his  plays,  the 
acrid  war  satire  Liluli,  contains,  among  other  things, 
the  novel  possibility  of  enacting  a  play  not  against 
a  curtained  background,  but  against  the  selfsame 
humanity  that  is  the  spiritual  background  as  well. 

Curiously  enough,  his  two  great  dramatic  in- 
spirers  were  Shakespeare  and  Renan;  yet  his  own 
theatrical  work  displays  neither  the  universality  of 
the  one  nor  the  beautiful  doubt  of  the  other.  In  the 
world  of  the  modern  drama  Rolland  is  important 
historically,  as  an  experimenter.  He  has  created 
little  dramatic  beauty,  not  merely  because  his  theory 
precluded  it,  but  because  of  that  deeper  something 
in  him  which  made  of  him  a  notable  power  for  world 
peace  and  could  in  the  first  suggest  to  him  that 
theory.  Rolland  the  man  is  far  greater  than  Rolland 
the  dramatist. 

A  young  contemporary  of  his,  much  less  heard  of, 
has  been  more  successful  with  similar  aims;  more 
genuinely  the  dramatic  artist   than   Rolland,  he  is 


254         rill     DKAMA  OF   TKANSITION 

perhaps  even    farther  distant    from    the   masses   for 
whom  avowedly  he  wrote. 

GEORGES  DLIIAMKL 

The  name  of  Georges  Duhanicl  became  known  in 
the  United  States  during  the  recent  conflict,  after 
our  entrance  into  it,  lor  several  hooks  of  vital  ex- 
periences and  human  vision.  Vet  long  before  this, 
the  noted  physician  had  initiated  his  literary  career 
with  many  verses  and  three  dramas  which,  if  not 
of  the  highest  worth,  yet  possess  uncommon  merit. 
Strangely  enough,  all  three  of  the  plays  were  in 
English  years  previous  to  the  translation  of  Du- 
hamel's  war  Ixxjks,  but  attracted  no  more  attention 
then  than  they  have  since.'  They  are,  like  the  dramas 
of  Holland,  the  result  of  a  theory  of  art  for  the 
masses,  yet,  like  more  than  one  such  attempt,  go 
over  the  heads  of  their  theoretical  audience. 

"The  old  art  values,"  wrote  Sasha  Rest,  intro- 
ducing Duhamel  and  his  aims  to  this  country, 
"have  made  way  for  new  ideals  in  which  intuition 
and  sensil/ility  are  the  most  important  factors. 
Detail  and  analysis  arc  no  longer  sought  after,  and 
the  harmony  to  be  found  in  masses  is  now  the  poet's 
inspiration.  Only  what  is  general,  unixcrsal,  is  of 
value.  The  cult  of  the  individual  has  ceded  its 
place  to  one  that  embraces  humanity  in  its  entirety. 
The  individual  counts  only  inasmuch  as  through 
him  the  largely  human  is  to  be  reached." 

This  generalization,  then,  was  one  of  the  chief 
traits  of  that  group  of  young  writers  to  whom  the 
Duhamel  of  ante-war  days  belonged.     And,  ah,  the 

•See  Poet  Lore,  summer  number,  1914  (which  contains  The  Litht);  autumn 
number.  1914  (containing  In  the  Shadow  of  the  Statues),  and  vacation  number, 
1915  (for  The  Combat).  The  translations,  with  introductor>'  material,  are  by 
Sasha  Best. 


FRANCE  255 

vagaries  of  theory!  With  a  similar  universality  of 
program,  a  similar  refutation  of  analysis,  behold 
the  divergent  destiny  of  the  German  Expressionists! 
The  abstractness  presupposed  in  such  generalization 
has  its  reflection  in  Duhamel's  dramaturgy.  He  has 
created  strong  environments  rather  than  strong 
characters;  at  times  the  background  seems  to  dom- 
inate his  personages.  The  men  and  women  do  not 
speak  the  language  of  everyday  life;  their  dialogue 
tends  to  lose  verbal  character  and  dissolve  into 
mood.  As  Best  says,  "Duhamel  aspires  to  reform 
the  modern  theatre  by  adding  a  lyric  idealistic 
element  to  the  realistic.  Over  realistic  scenes  of 
his  plays  hovers  an  atmosphere  of  strange  unreality, 
in  which  his  characters  move  and  act.  A  large  and 
beautiful  symbolism  prevails." 

Perhaps  the  best  expression  of  Duhamel's  purpose 
may  be  gleaned  from  his  own  writings.  In  his 
Propos  Critiques  (quoted  by  his  translator)  he  gives 
to  the  world  his  own  ars  poetica^  which  applies  as 
well  to  his  plays  as  to  his  poems: 

The  moment  has  come  when  man  directly  must  be 
addressed.  Honor  and  love  to  the  poet  who  strives  to 
be  man  first  and  then  the  po'et;  honor  and  love  to  the 
poet  who,  filled  with  his  mission,  zealously  seeks  the  one 
word,  the  one  song  that  will  reach  all  men  of  all  races. 
The  greatest  worth  in  the  poet's  art  lies  in  his  greatest 
generality.  And  let  it,  above  all,  be  a  living  art!  .  .  . 
It  permits  of  no  rules  and  regulations,  and  will  come 
under  the  head  of  no  system.  We  are  in  the  center  of  a 
movement  which  is  at  one  and  the  same  time  a  reaction 
and  a  continuation.  ...  It  behooves  a  new  art,  how- 
ever, to  choose  among  the  realities  of  life  those  that 
preserve  the  individual  in  all  his  nati\'e  grandeur.  The 
eyes  of  the  poet  of  to-day  stray  less  toward  the  clouds, 


256         IHK  UKAMA  OI<    IRANSITION' 

hut  he  seeks  with  his  eyes  those  of  his  fcllow-mcn.  He 
nc)  longer  dwells  in  towers,  but  ilcsires  to  step  out  and 
give  affectionate  greeting  to  his  fellow-creatures. 

All  of  which  is  written  in  a  style  that  is  not  in- 
frequently employed  by  the  persons  of  Duhamel's 
dramas.  The  context,  however,  is  misleading,  and, 
as  we  have  hinted,  the  noted  Parisian's  plays  are 
no  more  for  the  masses  necessarily  than  the  verses 
of  Whitman.  I'he  very  lyricism  of  the  dialogue,  the 
broadness  of  the  symbolism,  the  originality  of  plot, 
the  refinement  of  passion,  the  cult  of  generality — 
render  the  plays  inaccessible  to  the  more  or  less 
theoretical  masses  for  which  Duhamel  and  his  group 
wrote  their  works. 

The  Hrst  play  to  be  considered  here  was  produced 
at  the  Theatre  de  L'Odeon  in  191  2,  under  the  direc- 
tion of  the  famous  Antoine,  founder  of  the  Theatre 
Libre.  Blanche  .Albane  (in  private  life  Mrs.  Du- 
hamel), the  protegee  of  Sarah  Bernhardt,  played  the 
leading  role,  as  she  has  done  for  her  husband's  two 
other  plays. 

In  The  Light  Duhamel's  main  characteristics  are 
strongly  evident.  It  is  here  a  case  not  of  those  who 
have  eyes  yet  see  not^  but  rather  of  those  wh(j,  not 
having  sight,  yet  see.  Bernard,  who  has  always 
lieen  blind,  is  endovveil  with  a  perspicacity  that 
penetrates  much  further  into  his  environment  than 
the  faithful  attendants  who  minister  to  his  needs. 
Far  from  being  anxious  to  recover  his  sight,  he  dis- 
courages his  father  in  any  attempts  which  will  lead 
to  such  an  end.  It  is  true  he  yields  to  the  latter's 
insistence,  but  only  out  of  love  to  a  parent  who  has 
gone  from  doctor  to  doctor  in  a  vain  search  to  bring 
back  the  light  to  his  son's  eyes. 


FRANCE  257 

Among  the  persons  who  make  up  Bernard's 
world  is  a  young  girl  named  Blanche,  who  loves 
him  with  a  simple,  yet  deep  passion  that  seeks  its 
happiness  in  self-effacement  and  service  to  the 
afflicted  one.  Blanche  is  not  like  the  other  girls; 
she  does  not  care  to  go  out  among  the  fields  and  the 
flowers.  She  sits  embroidering  for  her  Bernard,  and 
through  her  very  love  seems  to  attain  the  power  of 
looking  upon  the  world  even  as  does  the  blind  man. 
Her  own  eyesight,  in  fact,  is  failing  her,  yet  she 
does  not  heed  it. 

Bernard,  once  all  hope  for  his  own  sight  is  gone, 
looks  to  Blanche  for  that  light  which  he  had  desired 
too  late.  She  shall  be  his  eyes.  Through  her  he 
shall  learn  to  see  the  world  as  do  all  the  others,  and 
thus  they  shall  find  happiness.  But  a  strange 
change  comes  over  Blanche — perhaps  a  forecast  of 
her  own  coming  blindness.  "My  words  are  childish," 
she  says  to  her  sweetheart.  "Take  them,  however, 
as  coming  from  reflection.  Nature  has  imposed  her- 
self on  us  by  every  means  in  her  power  and  has  put 
into  our  heads  something  terrible,  something  over- 
whelming: and  that  is  the  light  of  our  eyes.  Ah, 
well,  it  is  but  a  perpetual  mirage,  a  perpetual  play, 
that  hinders  our  soul  from  a  communing  with  itself. 
I  am  sure  of  that;  it  has  come  to  me  since  I  have 
known  you." 

Bernard  is  frightened  at  the  queer  talk  of  the 
girl.  From  the  warmth  upon  his  cheek  he  knows 
that  the  sun  is  shining.  He  draws  aside  the  curtains 
and  points  to  the  scene  outside.  He  urges  her  to 
tell  him  all  that  she  sees.  Upon  every  word  of  hers 
he  hangs  as  if  it  were  an  inestimable  treasure.  He 
enlarges  upon  her  slightest  expression;  he  drinks  in 


258        THK  13RAMA  OV  TRANSITION 

every  description  avidly  and  thirsts  tor  more,  still 
more,  fhe  bewildered  girl,  seeking  in  vain  for  more 
vivid  terms  in  which  to  convey  to  the  sightless  one 
the  glories  of  the  sunset,  is  suddenly  stricken  blind. 
She  falls  against  Bernard  in  a  swoon,  while  he,  realiz- 
ing that  something  terrible  must  ha\c  happened, 
cries  for  aid. 

Blanche's  case,  however,  is  not  hopeless.  With 
diligent  care  her  sight  may  be  restored  in  a  very 
short  while.  logether,  Blanche  and  Bernard  go 
walking,  she  with  her  eyes  bandaged,  utterly  de- 
pendent upon  Bernard  for  guidance.  The  latter, 
accust(MTied  to  almost  every  nook  of  the  country 
because  of  his  frequent  walks  and  his  fine  sense  of 
locality,  leads  his  charge  with  full  confidence.  He 
brings  her  to  a  statue  which,  when  she  still  had  her 
sight,  she  had  passed  often  without  really  appreciat- 
ing its  beauty.  He  takes  her  hand  and  passes  it 
over  the  form  of  the  sculpture  and  teaches  her  to 
see  the  various  limbs  with  her  hands,  so  to  speak, 
to  grasp  the  proptjrtion  of  the  whole,  the  jxisition, 
the  general  effect.  It  is  he,  the  blind,  who  must  see 
for  her,  the  erstwhile  seeing. 

A  thunilerstorm  is  brewing.  The  lovers,  engrossed 
in  their  sightless  pleasure,  at  first  do  not  hear  it. 
But  Blanche  becomes  timid,  and  in  trying  to  dis- 
cover the  way  back  both  are  confused.  Bernard 
tries  to  distract  Blanche's  mind  from  the  terrors  of 
the  storm,  but  in  vain.  Slowly,  unnoticed  by  her 
companion,  she  lifts  her  hand  to  her  bandage,  draw- 
ing it  off  from  her  eyes.  For  one  moment  she  be- 
holds the  landscape,  sees  how  they  have  erred  in 
their  attempt  to  regain  the  right  road,  and  then — 


FRANCE  259 

an  intense  flash  of  lightning  which  destroys  Blanche's 
sight  forever. 

Together,  the  blind  leading  the  blind,  they  fare 
forth  into  the  storm,  A  searching  party  is  sent  out 
for  them.  Meanwhile  they  are  approaching  the 
edge  of  a  cliff  in  the  vicinity.  Bernard  knows  the 
danger,  and  only  at  the  last  moment,  when  he  feels 
that  together  they  are  to  fall  over  the  height  in 
their  confusion,  does  he  make  an  avowal  of  love 
that  is  more  like  a  prayer  than  a  confession.  He 
draws  the  entranced  girl  to  him  and  kisses  her.  As 
he  does  so  the  lovers,  not  without  a  symbolistic 
significance,  turn  away  from  the  direction  of  the 
cliff's  edge. 

Blanche:    All  roads  now  are  good  for  us. 

Bernard:  No,  no.  I  don't  want  to  make  any  more 
mistakes.     {They  go  to  the  left.) 

Blanche:     Yes,  that  is  the  way  we  must  go. 

Bernard:     I  think  it  is  there.     .     .     . 

Blanche:  Slowly,  let  us  go  slowly.  I  am  very  happy, 
I  am  sure  now  that  we  shall  arrive. 

One  of  the  commendable  things  about  the  play  is 
the  illusion  of  blindness  which  the  author  conveys 
through  the  very  words  which  Bernard  utters. 
His  speech,  its  similes  and  expressions,  are  those  of 
one  whose  sight  is  all  within.  To  Bernard  himself 
words  become  what  scenes  are  to  the  seeing.  "There 
are  words,"  he  says,  in  one  of  the  most  beautiful 
passages,  "that  have  been  of  such  good  service,  they 
have  passed  so  many  lips  that  they  possess  a  per- 
sonal warmth,  and  properties  that  are  not  merely 
borrowed.  When  you  put  a  shell  to  your  ear  you 
hear  a  noise  like  that  of  a  cascade  or  a  tempest,  and 


260        THE  DRAMA  OF  TRANSITION 

people  say  that  because  the  shell  has  lived  so  long 
in  the  sea  it  has  retained  its  roar.  It  is  like  that  with 
words.  They  grow  polished  and  hard  with  time 
and  they  take  on  the  quality  of  the  things  they  ex- 
press. I  know  nothing  about  the  light,  yet  when 
you  pronounce  with  your  beautiful,  flexible  voice 
such  words  as  light,  transparence,  or  sun,  there 
suddenly  are  born  in  me  all  manner  of  violent 
images  that  cause  me  to  tremble  as  though  shaken 
by  thunder." 

The  second  of  Duhamel's  plays  to  be  considered 
was  presented  in  the  winter  of  1913  on  the  same 
stage  as  the  previous  drama.  The  title  is  slightly 
symbolistic,  as  is  the  play.  But  hi  the  Shadow  of 
the  Statues  contains  less  of  the  symbolistic  than 
The  Lights  and  much  less  than  The  Combat.  If  the 
dialogue  is  less  suffused  with  the  idealistic  incense 
in  which  Duhamel  seeks  to  envelop  the  speech  of 
his  creatures,  it  is  because  the  play  does  not  demand 
such  a  technique  as  his  two  others.  The  psychology 
of  the  leading  figure,  Robert,  has  clearly  been 
affected  by   Ibsen's  self-asserting  men   and  women. 

Robert  Hailly  has  grown  up  in  an  environment 
which  has  robbed  him  of  every  atom  of  individ- 
uality. He  is  the  son  of  the  great  writer  Bailly,  and 
to  the  memory  of  the  latter,  to  its  perpetual  glorifi- 
cation, he  has  been  unwillingly  dedicated.  It  is 
almost  as  if  he  himself  is  nobody — merely  the  son 
of  the  great  Bailly.  Upon  the  eve  of  a  great  event, 
— the  dedication  of  a  monument  to  his  famous  father, 
Robert  rebels  against  the  systematized  adulation  of 
his  father  that  is  robbing  him  of  himself.  He  views 
with  impatience  the  intellectual  lackeys  that  flock 
in  the  neighborhood,  anxious  to  shine  in  the  reflected 
glory  of  a  great  man. 


FRANCE  261 

Worst  of  all,  he  must  deliever  a  speech  at  the  un- 
veiling of  the  monument,  a  eulogy  to  Bailly.  This 
his  finer  senses  simply  cannot  permit.  He  has  read 
the  works  of  his  father,  he  does  not  agree  with  the 
opinions  there  expressed,  he  opposes  them,  in  fact. 
And  the  writer  of  these  opinions  he  must  glorify  on 
the  morrow!  In  a  scene  with  his  sweetheart,  Alice, 
he  tells  her  that  his  heart  is  not  in  the  words  he 
must  deliver.  They  look  out  on  the  garden.  Here 
at  last  Robert  seems  to  find  repose  from  the  swarm 
of  busybodies  that  fill  every  room  of  the  home, 
rehearsing  the  activities  of  the  great  day.  After  a 
time  Alice  points  to  a  table  in  the  garden.  "Is  it 
true  that  it  was  on  that  table  that  your  father 
wrote  his  beautiful  book,  you  know,  The  Power  of 
Love?"  At  this  sudden  recalling  of  the  paternal 
fame  the  garden  loses  all  charms  for  Robert.  He 
wishes  to  be  off,  anywhere  at  all,  so  it  be  removed 
from  the  Bailly  environment! 

Throughout  that  morning  a  certain  Hilaire  has 
been  trying  to  get  into  personal  touch  with  Robert. 
Only  in  the  afternoon  does  this  patient  emissary 
break  through  the  barbed-wire  of  ceremony  and 
penetrate  into  an  interview  with  the  son  of  the 
famous  Bailly.  He  whispers  a  few  words  to  Robert, 
then  a  few  more.  A  packet  of  letters  is  passed  into 
Robert's  hands,  and  then  comes  a  terrible  discovery. 
Robert  is  not  the  son  of  the  great  Emanuel  Bailly! 
This  is  so  clearly  proved  that  not  a  shadow  of  doubt 
remains. 

Robert  locks  himself  in  his  room  until  the  storm 
within  him  subsides.  His  mother,  who  has  guessed 
the  cause  of  his  perturbation,  takes  the  matter 
quite  philosophically  and  awaits  developments. 


262        THh  DRAMA  Ul-    IRANSiriON 

Later,  when  Robert  sees  Alice,  his  indignation 
bursts  out  anew: 

I  have  been  thrust  into  a  coKl  and  clinging  darkness. 
.  .  .  I  am  still  too  oppressed  by  the  news  that  a  poor 
devil  has  brought  me  without  knowing  the  price  of  what 
he  was  bringing.  All  those  people  were  there  around  me 
to  watch  my  j^rofile  ami  the  movements  of  my  face. 
When  I  smiled  they  all  said,  "There  is  the  smile  of  Eman- 
uel Bailly!"  And  when  I  was  calm  they  all  thought, 
"It  is  the  same  gravity!"  And  when  I  showed  anger, 
they  looked  at  each  other  and  murmured,  "It  is  aston- 
ishing. He  resembles  him  also  in  his  violence  and  his 
force."  ...  A  marionette,  the  prey  of  all  the  pho- 
tographers and  the  newspapers!  {Approaches  the  statue 
of  E.  Bailly.)  Vou  can  see  for  yourself  that  I  do  not 
resemble  this  man:  the  bone  formation  is  entirely  differ- 
ent, and  the  rest  they  have  transformed  by  means  of 
discourses  ami  examples.  I  had  to  cut  my  beard  like 
his,  and  my  moustache,  ami  I  had  to  draw  back  my  hair 
as  he  used  to  draw  back  his.     .     .     . 

•Alice,  true  to  Robert,  is  ready  to  fly  with  him 
whither  he  will  go.  He  will  take  a  poor,  unknown 
name,  he  will  write  his  own  thoughts,  not  those  of 
another.  He  shall  be  something  more  than  a  lit- 
erary shadow.  "Oh,  Alice!  since  you  love  me,  tell 
me  that  I  am  not  merely  a  shadow,  and  that  I  have 
perhaps  my  genius — a  genius  of  my  own. 

But  it  is  not  to  be.  The  fetters  of  a  lifetime,  even 
though  woven  of  a  lie,  have  been  bound  round  the 
victim  too  long  thus  to  be  shaken  off  in  a  day. 
There  is  a  strong  scene  between  Robert  and  his 
mother,  in  which  she  by  her  masterly  tongue, 
overcomes  her  son  just  as  he  is  on  the  threshold  of 
his  soul's  liberty.     He  goes  back  into  the  shadow  of 


FRANCE  263 

his  father's  statues,  a  subdued  man — the  son  of  a 
father  who  is  not  his  father,  the  eulogist  of  a  writer 
with  whom  he  disagrees.  The  environment  has  en- 
gulfed its  prey. 

The  Light  contained  no  humor.  It  was  a  sombre 
drama  of  the  inner  person,  even  as  is  this.  The 
real  action  was  an  invisible  struggle.  /«  the  Shadow 
of  the  Statues  contains  several  passages  that  reveal 
Duhamel  as  a  clever  hand  in  the  humors  of  both 
low  comedy  and  satire.  The  love  element,  as  in  the 
two  other  plays,  is  distinctly  secondary. 

It  is  in  The  Combat^  produced  in  the  winter  of 
1 9 13  at  the  Theatre  des  Arts,  that  we  have  perhaps 
the  best  of  these  three  plays.  The  dialogue  is  the 
author's  most  lyric-idealistic  effort;  the  background 
is  portrayed  with  a  vividness  that  shines  through 
the  speech  and  the  actions  of  every  person;  there 
is  a  unity  of  mood  which  is  atmosphere  itself. 

There  is  a  land  that  is  ravaged  by  the  regular 
overflow  of  the  sea.  It  is  owned  by  one  family,  of 
which  three  generations  are  living.  There  is  the  old 
grandfather,  ninety  years  of  age.  Then  comes 
Vincent,  an  invalid  of  sixty,  to  whom  the  most 
interesting  things  in  the  world  are  his  rheumatic 
pains.  Gerard,  the  son  of  Vincent,  is  a  young  man 
of  twenty-three.  The  family  is  wealthy;  it  is  char- 
itable, too,  yet  the  misery  of  the  land  knows  no 
bounds.  Everywhere  land  that  might  be  rich  with 
the  bounties  of  earth  lies  under  a  devastating  flood. 
The  very  atmosphere  of  the  country  is  permeated 
with  a  dampness  that  penetrates  the  marrow  of  all. 

Hubert,  the  family  physician,  is  one  who  sees 
beneath  symptoms  and  complaints.  He  knows  the 
real  curse  of  the  land;  he  has  been  in  the  wretched 


264        THK  DK.AMA  OF   TRANSITION 

huts  of  the  laborers,  he  has  seen  the  baneful  effects 
of  the  inundation.  He  suggests  to  Vincent  that  a 
hght  should  be  made  against  the  ravages  of  rlie 
deluge.     Vincent  is  rich,  vvhv  ncjt  tlo  it? 

Hubert  has  a  sister,  Anne  Marie,  who  loves  young 
Gerard.  The  same  cause  that  the  doctor  pleads 
with  the  father  Anne  Marie  pleads  with  the  son. 
She  seeks  to  inspire  Gerard  with  a  determination 
to  conquer  the  mighty  forces  of  the  water.  But  hjL*, 
with  the  foreboding  of  illness,  is  loath  to  undertake 
a  task  the  end  of  which  he  may  never  li.ve  tn  see. 

I   have  attempted  nothing,  and  I'm  already  beaten. 

I  was  beaten  before  I  was  born. 

You  want  me  to  be  more  than  a  man,   - 

A  hero,  perhaps,  a  hero! 

But  I  have  reHectcd — if  I  were  to  rise 

Anti  but  raise  my  hand  to  give  an  order, 

I  know  that  a  sudden  sharp  pain  in  my  breast 

Would  remind  me  that  I  had  ilonc  too  much, 

And  that  those  marked  for  the  sacrifice 

Had  better  never  try  at  all. 

Geraril's  premonition  is  only  too  true.  A  little 
while  later  he  is  seized  with  an  attack  of  coughing 
and  he  must  be  carried  to  his  room.  "You  see,"  he 
gasps  to  .Anne  Marie,  "you  see  it  only  too  well." 
Gerard  has  a  cousin  of  some  thirty  years,  named 
Michel.  The  latter  is  an  architect,  and  is  at  present 
at  work  upon  a  mausoleum  desired  of  him  by 
Gerard's  father.  As  Gerard  slowly  recovers  from 
his  attack,  the  words  of  Anne  Marie  begin  to  bear 
fruit  within  him.  He  would  take  Michel  away 
from  the  mediocre  occupation  of  mausoleum  build- 
ing and  set  him  to  work  upon  a  dike — a  powerful 
wall   that  shall   thrust  back  the  waters  of  the  sea 


FRANCE  265 

and  reconquer  the  land  for  the  people.  Michel  is 
the  incarnation  of  health  and  self-confidence;  through 
him  Gerard  hopes  to  accomplish  the  great  task  of 
redemption. 

The  architect  calculates  that  it  will  take  three 
years  to  do  the  work.  But  more  than  money  will 
be  needed — the  enthusiasm  and  courage  of  the 
whole  people.  The  fortune  is  there,  the  people 
must  be  aroused  from  their  passive  acceptance  of 
the  sea's  mastery. 

When  Anne  Marie  comes  to  inquire  about  Gerard's 
health  he  greets  her  with  a  new  passion: 

My  health  is  not  of  the  least  importance; 

It  would  seem  that  I  am  cured — 

What  I  am  now  going  to  tell  you 

Is  larger  than  my  person.     {Takes  her  to  the  table.) 

Look  there!     See  the  picture  of  the  country. 

Look  well:  my  hands  hold  down  the  paper; 

Thus  will  I  with  these  my  hands, 

Mastering  the  earth  and  all  the  men 

That  are  immersed  in  their  labors, 

Force  all  to  obey  me  hereafter 

Like  one  who  creates — his  thumbs  in  the  clay! 

Look  again!     All  the  designs  of  this  map, — 

Are  they  not  in  truth  rocks  and  sand 

And  green  fields  with  their  waving  trees 

From  which  I  will  drive  the  water 

Because  I  have  so  willed  it? 

The  country  is  aroused.  The  dike  is  started  and, 
after  weary  labors,  nears  the  point  of  completion. 
There  is  not  a  moment  to  be  lost,  for  the  floods  are 
rising  and  may  soon  render  the  entire  work  a  use- 
less heap  of  stones.  Efforts  are  redoubled;  every 
person  is  enlisted  in  the  final  attack.     Every  person 


266        THE  DRAMA  OF  TRANSITION 

— except  Gerard,  who,  in  the  excitement  of  the 
finishing  t(juches,  is  left  alone.  A  woman  passing 
by  labors  under  the  heavy  burden  assigned  to  her. 
Gerard,  wishing  to  play  some  part  in  the  glorious 
task,  if  only  an  insignificant  one,  attempts  to  assist 
the  woman,  when  he  is  stricken  with  a  hemorrhage 
and  dies.  The  woman  has  gone  on,  and  he  falls 
behind  a  pile  of  stones,  unseen  to  the  triumphant 
procession  that  soon  comes  marching  toward  the 
corpse.  The  crowd  acclaims  Michel,  who  holds 
Anne  Marie's  hands.  Gerard,  the  real  force  behind 
the  project,  is  forgot.ttn  in  the  tumult.  He  has 
died  in  the  moment  of  victory,  a  victim  to  the 
power  which  he  had  conquered. 

If  Duhamel  has  created  any  real  characters,' 
such  was  not  perhaps  his  intention.  Hut  despite 
the  playwright's  theory  of  generalization,  Gerard, 
Robert  (of  the  previous  play),  and  Bernard  of  The 
Light  are  individuals  possessing  marked  vitality; 
they  are  more  than  abstractions.  None  of  Du- 
hamel's  women,  however,  stands  out.  In  The  Com- 
bat Duhamel  has  given  a  vivid  portrayal  of  the 
working  tolk.  If,  in  some  details,  he  is  not  above 
such  conventional  devices  as  stage  storms  and 
letters  that  cast  a  shadow  of  melodrama  over  the 
scene,  he  has  created  a  little  dramatic  beauty  that 
even  to-day,  after  so  many  changes  in  the  fashions 
of  the  theatre,  deserves  the  attention  of  the  few 
that  do  not  wear  their  ideas  in  conformity  to  the 
whims  of  our  dramaturgic  modistes. 

'  Of  hi3  latest  play,  L'CEuvre  des  Athlites,  Henry  Bordeaux,  in  La  Vie  au  Thiitre, 
demi^re  serie,  1919-1921,  speaks  very  highly,  commending  its  satirical  verve,  iu 
humor,  and  noting  a  too  deliberate  presentation  of  character. 


GERMANY 


GERMANY 

EXPRESSIONIST  THEORY 

German  "Expressionism,"  in  its  simplest  phase, 
is  a  reaction  in  poetry,  prose,  painting,  and  drama 
against  the  Naturalism  of  the  Nineties.  While  it 
came  into  prominence  during  the  war,  which  incited 
some  of  its  most  characteristic  efforts,  it  thus  dates 
back  to  the  earliest  dissatisfaction  with  the  exagger- 
ated attention  to  reality  that  was  the  hall-mark  of 
the  naturalistic  school.  It  has  been  qualified  as  a 
new  Storm  and  Stress  period^ — or,  to  be  more  exact, 
as  part  of  such  a  turmoil  in  the  arts— and  the  well- 
known  literary  Jew-baiter,  Bartels,  adduces  it  as 
fresh  proof  of  his  theory  that  a  new  Sturm  und 
'Drang  appears  every  thirty  years,  which  is  to  say 
during  every  generation.  Naturalism  would  thus 
reach  its  apex  in  1890,  with  the  present  artistic 
unrest  coming  to  maturity  circa  1920.  The  same 
theorist  would  see  in  Symbolism  the  first  stage  of 
Expressionism,  but  the  truth  is  that  the  new  "ism" 
does  not  represent  a  clear-cut,  unified  reaction  or 
progression;  it  is  not,  in  the  pure  sense  of  the  word, 
a  movement,  composed  as  it  is  of  protestants  who 
have  in  common  only  the  ardor  of  their  protest.^ 
Close  attention  to  the  theory  and  the  practice  of 
the  Expressionists  renders  even  a  definite  distinc- 
tion between  them  and  their  supposed  enemies,  the 

1  Die  deutsche  Dichtung  der  Gegenwart,  von  Adolf  Bartels.  Die  JUngsten,  Leip- 
zig, 1921,  page  208. 

>  The  first  clearly  recognizable  "Expressionist"  play  appeared  four  years 
before  the  outbreak  of  the  great  conflict.  It  was  the  pious,  ecstatic  Reinhard 
Serge's  Der  Bettler,  prototype  of  Unruh's  Geschlecht  and  Kornfeld's  Die  Verfilhrung. 

269 


270       THE  DRAMA  OF  TRANSITION 

Impressionists,  rather  difficult,  and  when  Bartcls 
points  to  the  Symbolists  as  representing  the  initial 
stage  of  the  Expressionist  reaction,  he  but  empha- 
sizes that  difficulty.'  The  name  itself  means  very 
little;  it  tells  as  little  of  the  aims  of  its  adherents  as 
do  such  flapping  pennons  of  progress  as  Futurism, 
Creationism,  and  the  rest.  What,  tor  that  matter, 
do  Classicism  and  Romanticism  really  say  of  them- 
selves, unaided  by  page  after  page  of  exegesis?  It 
is  high  time  for  a  radical  reform  of  all  literary 
terminology. 

One  undoubted  eft'cct  of  the  war  in  Germany  has 
been  to  stimulate  theatrical  production  to  an  un- 
wonted degree.  "Seldom,"  says  Manfred  Schneider,' 
"have  so  many  pieces  been  written  as  in  our  day." 
And  just  as  the  Italian  Futurists,  under  the  lead  of 
Marinetti,  attempted  to  capture  the  theatre  and 
turn  it  into  the  chief  vehicle  of  their  peculiar  prop- 
aganda, so  have  the  Expressionists  in  Germany,  in 
their  desire  to  reach  the  heart  oi  the  people,  invaded 
the  province  of  the  drama  with  avowed  apostolic 
aims.  Art,  as  one  of  their  slogans  proclaims,  must 
become  the  common  possession  of  the  people. 

Yet  it  was  through  the  other  arts  that  Expres- 
sionism made  its  way  to  the  stage.  Much  of  its 
theoretical  background  had  already  been  elaborated 
in  painting,  which,  reacting  against  that  same  pho- 
tographic realism  which  prevailed  in  naturalistic 
drama,  sought  a  certain  neo-primitivism  by  a  return 
to  ancient  Egyptian  art,  to  the  Grecian  vases,  to 
the  simple,  mystic  Gothic  forms.  Unessential  de- 
tail was  abandoned  in   favor  of  stylization;  in  the 

'  Bartels  indicates  as  one  of  the  Expressionist  precursors  in  poetry,  the  founder 
of  German  Impressioni-sm,  Arno  HoU. 

•  Der  Expressionismus  im  Drama.    Stuttgart,  1920. 


GERMANY  271 

words  of  one  of  their  chief  theoreticians,  Konrad 
Lange,  "The  illusion  of  reality  is  not  a  condition  of 
the  artistic."  "One  must  so  transform  an  object," 
says  another,  ".  .  .  as  if  it  never  had  any 
relation  to  any  other  object."  The  tendency  was 
toward  the  passional  immediacy  of  music,  which,  in 
Schneider's  words,  alone  of  the  arts  can  be  "purely 
expressionistic."  But  was  it  not  Verlaine,  heralding 
the  Symbolists,  who  wrote  "de  la  musique  avant 
toute  chose?"  Expressionism  is  a  child  of  many 
ancestors;  one  may  not  say  for  a  certainty  whether 
it  will  grow  to  adulthood;  but,  like  the  infant  fondly 
watched  over  by  its  doting  parents,  it  reveals  in  its 
restless  features  now  the  traces  of  this  relative,  now 
of  that.    It  belongs  to  them  all. 

Its  evolution  in  Germany  has  been  traced  from 
Kleist,  Grillparzer,  and  Hebbel  (somebody,  only  the 
other  day,  was  calling  "Genoveva"  an  elder  sister 
of  the  Expressionists)  through  to  Wilbrandt  and 
Wildenbruch.  And  why  not  the  youthful  Goethe 
with  his  "Expressionistic"  drama  around  Gotz  von 
Berlichingen?  And  Faust^  with  its  world-wide 
ideology,  its  panoramic  scenery,  its  symbolism.'* 
And  Schiller,  with  his  universal  idealism? 

The  Naturalistic  movement,  founded  upon  sci- 
entific materialism,  had  its  world-program  in  a  sort 
of  generalized  socialism.  Bound  up  as  it  was  with 
surrounding  reality,  it  sought  detail  in  both  matter 
and  mind,  leading  thus  to  excess  of  scenic  minutiae 
and  of  psychological  probing.  Man  was  the  creature 
of  his  milieu.  The  inevitable  idealistic  reaction  was 
twofold;  on  the  one  hand  the  Neo-Romantics,  headed 
by  Hugo  von  Hofmannsthal,  on  the  other,  the  Neo-i 
Classicists,  as  represented  by  Paul  Ernst.     A  need] 


272        THE  DRAMA  OF  TRANSITION 

began  to  be  felt  for  a  more  ample  sweep),  more  solid 
matter,  a  more  plastic  medium  for  the  idea.  Ex- 
pressionism thus  appeared  as  the  opponent  of  both 
Naturalism  and  Neo- Romanticism. 

Art,  in  the  words  of  Edschmid,  chief  of  the  Ex- 
pressionist manifesto  writers,  must  become  jx)sitive, 
active — must  rise  from  the  inspection  of  detail  to 
the  all-informing  Spirit.  Spirit  must  dictate,  shap- 
ing matter  and  not  remaining  dependent  upon  it. 
Art  shall  ascend  to  vision  upon  the  wings  of  universal 
feeling.  The  work  of  art  must  germinate  trom  the 
idea.  Detail  gives  way  to  the  universal,  the  typical. 
Both  the  dramatist  and  his  creatures  must  bear  the 
impress  of  a  IVeltayischauuyig^  a  philosophy  of  the 
world.  The  accidental  gives  way  to  the  essential — 
an  essential  that  acquires  firmer  outlines,  ampler 
sweep,  tenser  form.  Things  and  persons  arc  to  be 
released  from  their  manifold  interrelationships  and 
speak  out  of  themselves  alone.  Arch  enemy  of  such 
a  program  is  psychology,  with  its  attention  to  things 
and  persons  in  their  interwoven  affinity  to  one 
another.  With  man  liberated  from  all  limitations 
he  becomes  once  again  capable  of  deep,  imiiiediate 
feelings.     (A  neo-primitive,  as  it  were.) 

The  Expressionist  dramatist  frees  man  from  his 
milieu;  he  writes  no  mere  plays  of  marriage,  no 
tragedies  that  arise  from  the  clash  of  convention 
against  the  ur^e  of  freedom;  he  presents  no  "puf>- 
pets  that  hang  trom  the  wires  of  psychological  views 
and  play,  laugh,  and  suffer  amid  the  laws,  the  atti- 
tudes, the  errors  and  vices  of  this  man-made  so- 
ciety,"'     (It   is   amusing   to   recall    that   Marinctti, 

'  Manfred  Schneider.  Dtr  Expressionismus  im  Drama,  pages  16.  17.  fFhe 
ajthor  summarizes  Edschmid's  manifesto.) 

Kasimir  Edschmid.  Uahtr  den  Exprtssiontsmus  in  dtr  LiUratur  und  die  nt<u 
D-cktunt-      Berlin,  1919 


GERMANY  273 

proceeding  from  a  similar  antagonism  to  psychology 
and  the  man-made  world,  has  given  us,  in  his  play, 
Elettricittd,  Sessuale^  a  play  in  which  two  of  the  per- 
sonages are  puppets  who  serve  the  author's  exhi- 
bitionistic  needs  and  provide  an  admirable  illustra- 
tion of  that  very  psychology  which  supposedly  is 
being  flouted.)  Such  a  drama  calls  for  a  new  tech- 
nique of  acting  and  production,  and  Paul  Kornfeld 
has  thus  presented  his  actors'  intuition  as  a  sub- 
stitute for  the  histrionic  realism  that  was  part  of  the 
naturalistic  method  upon  the  stage.  "Let  the 
actor  take  no  particular  pains  in  producing  the  im- 
pression that  the  thought  and  the  word  that  he  is 
to  express  came  to  him  only  at  the  moment  when 
he  speaks  them;  if  he  is  supposed  to  die  upon  the 
stage,  he  has  no  need  of  visiting  a  hospital  to  learn 
how;  nor  to  go  to  a  tavern  to  study  how  people  act 
when  they're  drunk.  .  .  ."  In  short,  he  is  to  be 
no  mere  imitator;  he  is  not  to  deny  the  theatricahty 
of  his  calling.  .  .  .  "The  melody  of  a  great  ges- 
ture says  more  than  what  used  to  be  called  Natural- 
ness ever  could." 

So  much  for  theory.  If,  in  certain  details  it  is 
difficult  to  distinguish  sharply  between  Impres- 
sionism and  Expressionism,  what  shall  we  say  when 
Schneider,  in  his  succinct  but  sound  pamphlet,  finds 
it  hard  to  draw  the  line  between  Expressionism  and 
that  very  Naturalism  against  which  it  revolted? 
The  truth  is  that  hate  and  love  connote  each  other, 
and  as  in  life,  so  in  letters,  we  retain  something  (now 
a  little,  now  much)  of  what  we  reject.  Schneider, 
too,  traces  the  earliest  origins  of  the  new  attitude 
back  to  the  Storm  and  Stress  of  the  late  eighteenth 
century.      In    the    young    Goethe    and    the    young 


274       THE  DRAMA  OF  TRANSITION 

Schiller  he  discovers  a  similar  "fanatical  underscor- 
ing of  the  idea,  a  heightening  of  the  expression,  al- 
though almost  everywhere  in  the  limits  of  a  bril- 
liantly observant  Naturalism.  The  later  Biichncr 
and  Grabbe  withdrew  further  from  Nature  and 
they  are  looked  upon  by  many  as  the  fathers  of  the 
Expressionistic  drama."  Wedckind,  in  certain  as- 
pects, particularly  his  free  technique  and  his  night- 
marish atmosphere,  joins  the  long  list  of  precursors, 
as  does  Maeterlinck  with  his  drenm  fantasies  and 
Strindberg  with  his  mystic  visions.  Indeed,  back 
of  the  Storm  and  Stress  of  the  eighteenth  century 
lie  the  Greeks,  the  perennial  precursors  in  whom 
each  age,  each  movement  finds  something  to  sup- 
port the  most  contradictory  assumptions.  To  the 
Expressionists,  the  Greeks  appealed  with  their 
symbolic,  typical  personages,  their  unnaturalistic 
technique,  their  vast  simplicity  of  style.  And,  as 
Schneitler  puts  it,  the  voung  revoltes  of  Germany 
"looked  immediately  back  to  them,  over  the  heads 
of  the  German  classics  who  had  also  been  influenced 
by  the  Greeks."  He  discerns  no  effect  of  /Eschylus, 
most  primitive  of  them  all,  upon  the  new  genera- 
tion. The  road  to  Sophocles  is  clearer.  "Is  it  not 
significant  that  already  Hugo  von  Hofmannsthal,  in 
his  efforts  to  defeat  bare  Naturalism,  came  to  deal 
with  Sophoclean  matter,  (Edipus  and  Eiectra.''  In 
most  recent  times  Hasenclever,  one  of  the  better- 
known  expressionist  dramatists,  has  harked  back 
to  Sophocles  with  his  Antigone J'^  In  Franz  VVerfel's 
Trderiyjnen  the  same  critic  sees  the  influence  of 
Euripides.  But  it  should  be  remembered  that  when 
the  new  German  dramatists  go  back  to  Greece,  to 
history  or  to  the  Bible,  it  is  to  produce  drama  of 


GERMANY  275 

to-day,  in  which  the  ancient  plot  acquires  a  peculiarly 
contemporary  application. 

With  reference  to  Expressionistic  production, 
Schneider  points  out  that  Hofmannsthal  sought,  for 
his  Sophoclean  plays,  a  regisseur  who  should  empha- 
size the  vast,  simple  line  and  blend  detail  into  a  grand 
unity.  "The  movement  demanding  a  strict  sim- 
plicity in  the  scenic  investiture  of  dramatic  works 
dates  back,  in  Germany,  to  Ludwig  Tieck  and 
Immermann."  The  work  must  speak  for  itself; 
color,  light,  and  form  are  the  means  for  presenting 
its  vast  simplicity,  replacing  the  cluttered  stage 
that  so  often  weighs  down  the  piece  itself. 

"It  is  not  very  long  since  this  movement  has  come 
to  the  fore.  But  one  may  well  maintain  that  the 
Expressionistic  stage  direction  preceded  the  Expres- 
sionistic drama.  .  .  .  One  may  even  say  that  the 
stage  was  waiting  for  the  Expressionistic  drama. "^ 

We  may,  then,  before  approaching  some  of  the 
dramatists  themselves,  attempt  a  summary  of  the 
none  too  lucid  principles  that  guide  the  Expres- 
sionists in  the  drama. 

Expressionism  is  as  yet  more  an  aim  than  an 
achievement.  It  is  a  reaction  against  Naturalism, 
international  in  character  and  spiritual  in  implica- 
tion. For  all  its  avowed  opposition  to  Impres- 
sionism, it  seems  fundamentally  but  a  deeper  aspect 
of  the  same  intense  subjectivity  predicated  by  the 
Impressionists.  It  is  complementary  rather  than 
antagonistic  to  Impressionism,  and  has  been  termed 

'  Manfred  Schneider.  Der  Expressionismus  im  Drama,  page  20.  This  does 
not  seem  to  agree  with  Mr.  Lewisohn's  statement  (see  his  review  of  Macgowan's 
The  Theatre  of  Tomorrow,  Nation,  February  8,  1922)  that  "Hence  in  Germany  the 
new  art  of  the  theater  has  always  followed  the  development  of  dramatic  literature 
and  has  rarely  attempted  to  influence  or  lead  it."  Our  own  new  drama,  however, 
has  long  been  preceded  by  the  scenic  artists,  and  now  O'Neill,  with  his  quasi- 
expressionistic  The  Emperor  Jones  and  The  Hairy  Ape  seems  to  have  answered 
the  call. 


276        THE  DRAMA  OF   IRANSITION 

the  male  element  in  art,  in  distinction  to  Impres- 
sionism, the  female  element.  One  might  emphasize 
the  difference  between  them  by  saying  that  Im- 
pressionism presents  the  world  in  terms  of  per- 
sonality, while  Expressionism  presents  personality  in 
terms  of  the  world.  The  Expressionists  are  not  only 
Neo-Romantic,  they  are  Neo-Primitive,  Neo-Classic, 
as  well.  Were  one  not  afraid  of  too  many  terms,  one 
might  call  them  esoteric  eclectics;  eclectic  they 
certainly  are,  and  if  anyone  can  discover  the  mean- 
ing of  half  their  labors  (those  of  Oskar  Kokoschka, 
for  example)  he  is  indeed  blesseil  with  second  sight. 
Thev  seek  to  create  a  fourth-dimensional  technique, 
in  which  time  and  space  dissolve  into  the  velocity 
of  thought.  .Artifice  is  replaced  by  intuition,  even 
in  the  acting;  ideas,  not  theses,  prevail;  feeling,  not 
psychology,  is  dominant.  The  materials  are  to  be 
employed  as  a  composer  employs  his  notes:  merging 
them  into  the  unity  of  an  immediate  apj")eal.  The 
whole,  with  its  preference  for  symbolic  types  rather 
than  characterized  indiyiduals,  is  to  be  infused  with, 
or  suffused  in,  an  atmo!f|->hcre  of  exaltation.  And 
characteristically  enough,  that  same  Schopenhauer 
in  whom  Remy  de  Gourmont  and  the  Symbolists 
found  some  of  their  "subjective  idealism,"  has  been 
referred  to  as  one  of  the  philosophic  sources  of  the 
Expressionists. 

The  Expressionist  critics,  who  do  not  differ  among 
themselves  quite  so  radically  as  do  the  dramatists, 
yet  reveal  interesting  divergences.  Bernhard  Diebold, 
in  perhaps  the  best  single  book  dedicated  to  these 
lyric  dramatists,'  notes  with  so  many  others  the 
yielding   of  Ibsen    and   Hebbel    to   Strindberg   and 

'  Anarckit  im  Drama.     Bernhard  Diebold.     Frankfurt  am  Main.  1921. 


GERMANY  277 

Wedekind  as  models;  he  distinguishes  between  the 
various  men,  agreeing  that  they  cannot  be  grouped 
under  any  all-inclusive  label.  More  important  still 
for  the  Expressionist  drama,  he  distinguishes  be- 
tween Seele  (soul)  and  Geist  (intellect),  indicating 
the  intensive,  instinctive  character  of  the  first  and 
the  extensive,  formative  character  of  the  second. 
The  danger  of  the  new  drama  is,  that  in  its  ardent 
battle  against  materialism,  its  almost  mystic  yearn- 
ing to  merge  into  universality,  it  may  sacrifice  Geist 
to  Seele  until  artistic  communication  becomes  too 
difficult.  "The  soul  as  soul  alone,  without  intel- 
lectual form  or  corporeal  frame,  is  impossible  in 
drama." 

As  a  result  of  the  intenser  preoccupation  with 
self,  the  new  type  of  play  develops  particular  forms, 
which,  while  they  may  often  be  referred  to  models 
in  the  past  (especially  Faust^  which  has  left  such  a 
numerous  progeny),  possess  a  decidedly  contempo- 
rary significance.  This  has  aptly  been  termed  Ego- 
drama,  and  has,  almost  through  necessity,  developed 
into  what  might  be  called  Alter-ego-drama.  No 
longer  does  man  struggle  against  a  Greek  Fate, 
against  other  men,  but  he  is  at  war  with  his  other 
selves.  In  himself  he  is  a  microcosm,  the  very  scei^e 
of  all  his  conflicts.  Hence  the  frequency  of  dream- 
representations,  the  many  shiftings  of  scene,  the 
rapid  revue-technique,  the  telegraphic  text.  Much 
of  this  passion  for  a^new  spirituality,  indeed,  sug- 
gests a  modernization  of  the  mystery,  the  auto 
sacramental^  the  morality;  at  times  it  sinks  to  a  sort 
of  psychoanalytic  allegory.  Self  often  is  com- 
panioned by  counter-self  (as  in  Hasenclever's  Ber 
Sohn),  or  by  a  multitude  of  changing  selves  (as  in 


278         IHK  DRAMA  OK  TRANSl HON 

Wcrfel's  Spicgclmensch).  Ancient  theological  queries 
acquire  new  poignancy,  and  one  feels  that  a  New 
Evangel  is  being  preached — one  no  less  strict  upon 
the  individual  conscience  for  all  its  frequent  free- 
dom from  orthodox  obligations  to  a  personal  God. 
The  drama,  in  short,  becomes  autobiographical, 
as  did  the  novel  before  it.  Hence  these  kaleidoscopic 
soul-adventures;  hence,  if  Dicbokl's  pertinent  sug- 
gestion be  accepted,  the  prevalence  of  historical 
plays,  which  provide  the  frame  tor  personal  views 
after  the  auth(jr  has  used  up  his  own  happenings. 
And  hence,  too,  the  temptation  to  use  the  stage  for 
its  own  sake,  until  Diebold,  who  is  fond  of  punning 
(was  it  not  he  who  spoke  of  the  Nirvauitas  )iirv(tn- 
itatitm^  with  reference  to  the  deliquescent  univer- 
sality of  the  lyric  dramatists?)  may  say  that  the 
modern  miracle  becomes  a  spectacle. 

Approaching  the  plays,  we  need  hardly  be  surprised 
to  hnd  that  the  various  devotees  of  the  new  drama 
differ  in  their  application  of  the  theories  and  in  the 
results  they  obtain.  As  an  introduction  to  the  out- 
and-out  Expressionists  I  should  like  to  consider 
somewhat  more  than  cursorily,  one  of  Hauptmann's 
recent  dramas,  Der  U'eisse  Heiland^  not  only  be- 
cause it  has  been  called  a  "fairly  Expressionistic 
work,"  and  the  conception  and  presentation  of  the 
character  of  Montezurrfa  termed  "thoroughly  Ex- 
pressionistic," but  because,  in  trying  to  reveal  the 
errors  of  such  a  view,  we  may  arrive  at  a  clearer 
understanding  of  the  Expressionists  in  action. 
Hauptmann,  of  course,  is  no  static  figure;  his  outer 
growth  has  paralleled  an  inner;  he  is  of  too  wide  a 
girth  to  be  contained  in  our  convenient  "isms";  the 


GERMANY  279 

hasty  dragooning  of  him  into  the  Expressionistic 
camp  attests  something  eternally  young  in  his  own 
being  no  less  than  the  impatience  of  critics  to  see 
things  whole  if  not  steadily.  He  is  no  Expressionist, 
though  he  has  undergone  some  of  the  influences  that 
have  shaped  the  confused  reaction. 

HAUPTMANN'S  DER  WEISSE  HEILAND 

The  White  Redeenier  takes  us  back  to  the  Mexico 
of  Montezuma  and  Cortez,  at  the  time  when  the 
two  civilizations  met  in  inevitable  clash  and  the 
worshipers  of  the  sun  god  went  down  before  the 
cross  of  the  conquistadores.  Hauptmann  calls  it  a 
"dramatic  fantasy";  he  has,  in  the  Horatian  phrase, 
changed  sky  but  not  spirit;  it  may  well  be  that  the 
fate  of  Montezuma,  which  one  German  critic  strik- 
ingly termed  Montezuma's  Passion,  is  not  devoid  of 
a  certain  application  to  the  man  of  the  twentieth 
century.  We  have  here  an  epic  tragedy  of  faith. 
Its  eleven  scenes — there  are  no  acts — are  as  many 
stages  of  the  protagonist's  ascending  path  to  mar- 
tyrdom. From  first  to  last  it  is  his  lot  in  which  we 
are  interested  and  over  which  the  poet  seems  most 
to  have  brooded.  The  play,  which  possesses  no 
"love  interest,"  is  written  in  trochaic  tetrameter,  so 
that,  naturally  enough,  as  one  reads  on,  the  throb 
of  "Hiawatha"  begins  to  hum  outside  one's  ear; 
but  the  emphasis  is  not  upon  the  poetry,  nor  are  the 
lines  often  laden  with  compelling  image,  deep  in- 
sight, magic  of  music.  Rather  has  the  author 
seemed  to  concentrate  upon  the  color  and  contrast 
of  background,  the  scenes  of  culminating  antag- 
onism, the  effects  of  grouping  and  a  certain  pageant- 
like flow  of  cumulative  episodes.     He  paints  in  his 


280       THE  DR^AMA  OF  TRANSITION 

background  with  broad  sweeps  of  the  brush;  his 
personages  stand  out  clearly  enough,  but  more  as 
huge  shadows  than  as  creatures  that  grow  before 
our  eyes.  Montezuma  alone  is  bodied  forth  in  the 
round,  breathes,  lives,  and  dies  within  our  sight. 
Were  it  not  that  the  unyielding  belief  in  the  advent 
of  the  white  redeemer  is  the  groundwork  of  his 
tragic  faith,  the  dramatic  fantasy  might  well  have 
been  named  Montezuma.  Hauptmann,  however,  has 
not  built  up  one  of  the  pseudo-historical  personage- 
plays  that  have  of  late  come  into  a  new  vogue.  The 
llliite  Redeeyner  is  only  incidentally  and  unavoidably 
historical  in  facture.  It  is,  fundamentally,  human 
and  universal. 

The  play  opens  upon  a  scene  in  a  small  apartment 
of  the  Temple  of  Quetzalcoatl  at  Tenochtitlan. 
Montezuma  listens  to  his  Priest  recount  the  prophecy 
according  to  which  a  white  saviour  shall  come  to 
redeem  the  son  of  the  Sun  and  his  loyal  subjects. 
Three  thousand  summers  have  followed  upon  as 
many  winters'  snows;  the  time  for  the  fulfillment  of 
the  prophecy  is  near.  Montezuma  is  filled  with  the 
fervor  of  belief.  .All  signs  point  to  the  great  and  holy 
moment.  News  has  come  of  strange  arrivals,  who 
seem  to  answer  the  details  of  the  forecast.  These 
creatures  who  have  risen  from  out  of  the  deep, 
upon  fiery  animals — dragons,  surely — who  bear  them 
upon  their  backs, — these  white  men  that  carry 
thunder  and  lightning  in  their  hands — are  these 
not  the  emissaries  of  the  white  saviour.''  Monte- 
zuma's belief  is  not  shared  by  his  advisers;  young 
Cacamazin  warns  him  from  the  first  not  to  trust 
the  demons  that  the  ocean  has  spewed  forth,  and 
the  Emperor's  own  son,  Guatemotzin,  adds  his  pro- 


GERMANY  281 

test.  Montezuma  is  deaf  to  all  entreaty;  these 
newcomers  are  not  enemies.  They  are  the  promised 
redeemers. 

The  second  scene  reveals  the  full  character  of 
Montezuma's  unshakeable  faith.  He  has  an  an- 
swer ready  for  every  adverse  interpretation.  Be- 
sides, are  not  his  loyal  subjects  rejoicing  in  the 
advent  of  the  white  comers.^  Is  there  not  the 
universal  cry,  "On  to  Cholula!  On  to  Cholula!" 
Let  there  be  no  more  argumentation,  then.  "I  am 
Master!" 

If  there  is  discord  among  the  Aztecs,  neither  is 
all  harmony  in  the  Spanish  camp,  into  which  we 
are  first  afforded  a  glimpse  in  the  third  scene.  The 
hot-headed  Pedro  de  Alvarado  finds  his  fellow- 
fighters  not  half  impetuous  enough;  tender-hearted 
Las  Casas  rebels  against  the  slaughter  of  children, 
women,  and  the  aged;  Gomara  thinks  chiefly  of  the 
salvation  being  brought  to  the  heathen  by  the  word 
of  Him  who  died  on  the  cross.  With  unconscious 
irony,  he  asks  his  companions  what  the  shedding  of 
human  blood  matters  beside  the  prospect  of  plant- 
ing the  holy  symbol  in  this  land  of  dark  horrors. 
Alvarado,  in  the  heat  of  argument,  has  drawn  his 
sword  against  one  of  his  own  (the  situation  par- 
allels one  in  the  previous  episodes  among  the  Aztecs) 
when  Cortez  appears  from  his  tent,  calling  to  his 
men  to  distinguish  between  friend  and  foe.  Cortez 
is  no  Montezuma;  he  has  a  clear  conception  of  his 
purpose  and  the  method  of  fulfillment.  He  has 
promised  Carlos  V  to  reduce  the  Aztec  emperor  to 
vassalage  and  vows  to  attack  his  aim  with  the  direct- 
ness and  the  fearlessness  of  the  soldier.  Even  as 
Montezuma  has  imposed  his  will  upon  the  differences 


282        THE  DRAMA  OF  TRANSITION 

rife  amongst  his  counsellors,  so  does  Cortez  impose 
his.  There  is  arrant  hypocrisy  in  his  reception  of 
Montezuma's  ambassadors  of  friendship;  no  sooner 
are  their  backs  turned  than  he  gives  orders  to 
advance  upon  Tenochtitlan. 

The  reports  of  the  Aztec  heralds,  however,  con- 
vince Montezuma  more  than  ever  that  he  has  be- 
held the  true  vision  of  fulfillment,  and  when  Cortez 
arrives  to  pay  his  military  visit,  he  is  received  bv 
the  Emperor  as  the  white  saviour  himself.  From  the 
first,  Montezuma  is  religiously  humble;  from  the 
first,  Cortez  is  arrogantly  wily.  The  land  has  be- 
wildered the  Spaniards'  sense;  it  is  a  dream  of  par- 
adise; its  wealth  of  gold  stuns  them.  To  such  a  sou! 
as  Las  Casas,  the  picture  appears  in  different  colors; 
to  him,  the  greatest  wonder  of  all  is  the  ruler  of  the 
empire.  "Never,  not  even  in  Europe,  have  I  beheld 
such  a  man  as  this.  He  seems  truly  a  stranger  to 
this  earth,  and  most  lonely."  But  Montezuma  is 
not  really  lonely;  for  him,  the  end  of  this  world  and 
the  beginning  of  a  greater  has  come;  Cortez  is  the 
white  redeemer;  when,  he  asks  the  conquistador, 
will  the  sun-chariot  appear  that  is  to  sweep  us  into 
the  heavens.^  The  astute  Snaniard,  with  his  mind 
upon  gold  and  conquest,  homes  his  lips  with  a  pious 
reply. 

The  perplexity  of  the  doubting  Aztecs  is  added 
to  by  the  similarity  between  their  own  cult's  syrn- 
bols  and  those  of  the  Spaniards;  there  are  analogues 
to  the  cross,  to  the  Madonna  and  the  Child.  Qual- 
popoca  and  his  kind,  however,  refuse  to  be  convinced 
by  such  argument.  "If  the  great  Huitlipochtli 
sends  us  such  redeemers,"  he  cries,  "then  I  prefer 
his  Hell  to  his  kingdom  of  Heaven.''    The  Spaniards 


GERMANY  283 

are  no  less  surprised  to  find  the  semblance  of  Chris- 
tian symbols  in  the  temple  of  a  heathen  war-god. 
Cortez'  arrogance  grows  with  Montezuma's  faith, 
but  there  comes  a  climactic  moment  when  the  dawn 
of  the  Emperor's  disillusionment  breaks.  The  con- 
queror, less  and  less  disposed  to  conceal  his  true 
colors,  finally  shatters  the  image  of  godhead  that  he 
had  reared  in  Montezuma's  heart. 

-Nie  hat  so  wie  du  ein  Mann 
seine  Gottheit  selbst  zertreten! 

exclaims  the  undeceived  ruler,  too  late,  as  he  is 
ignominiously  fettered  by  command  of  the  mortal 
in  whom  he  had  beheld  the  white  saviour. 

From  this  point  on  the  attitude  of  the  populace 
changes;  a  holy  dance  of  theirs  is  by  the  rashness  of 
Alvarado  (temporarily  in  charge,  because  Cortez  has 
been  forced  to  leave  in  order  to  quell  disturbances 
on  the  coast)  converted  into  a  massacre.  The  one 
hope  of  bringing  the  wild  Aztecs  to  their  senses  is  to 
get  Montezuma  to  appear  before  them  in  his  im- 
perial robes  and  quell  the  outburst  by  his  august 
presence.  Montezuma,  however,  has  sunk  into  a 
brooding,  apparently  indifferent  silence.  The  guards 
suspect  him  of  harboring  suicidal  thoughts;  in  fact, 
Montezuma  goes  upon  what  we  now  call  a  "hunger 
strike,"  refusing  to  eat  and  drink.  He  tries  the  pa- 
tience of  his  captors  sorely,  and  Cortez  harbors  a 
final  means.  If  he  must,  he  will  have  Montezuma 
forcibly  attired  in  his  regal  splendor  and  shoved  out 
in  sight  of  his  subjects.  This  the  conquistador  is 
compelled  to  do.  The  Emperor  is  thrust  into  his 
jewels  and  his  cloak,  and  dragged  forth.  To  little 
avail,   however,   for  Montezuma,   instead  of  main- 


284        THE  DRAMA  OF    TRAXSITION 

taining  silence,  addresses  the  nuiltitude,  who  aim 
their  missiles  not  at  the  treacherous  Spaniards,  hut 
at  their  own  ruler.  Perhaps  he  has  asked  them,  in 
their  own  tongue,  to  do  him  the  mercy  of  slaying 
him.  He  is  brought  dying  before  Cortez,  and  during 
a  flicker  of  consciousness  before  his  last  breath 
rejects  Gomara's  anxious  plea  for  conversion  U)  the 
faith  of  his  betrayers,  rending  his  tetters  in  a  Hnai 
access  of  frenzied  strength. 

Such,  in  an  outline  that  robs  the  piece  of  all  its 
vitalizing  elements,  is  the  story  of  T/ie  IVhite  Re- 
deemer. Montezuma  is  not  only  an  A/tec  king — he 
is  any  man  of  any  epoch  who  follows  blimlly  a  com- 
pelling vision  and  wakes  too  late  to  the  harsh  reality 
behind  it.  He  is  the  trusting  soul;  were  he  born  a 
Spaniard  he  would  have  been  such  a  one  as  the  tender 
Las  Casas,  who  had  sensed  the  concealed  truth  that 
duty  may  walk  hand  in  hand  with  mercy.  He  is 
the  symbol  of  yielding  good  that  is  so  readily  van- 
quished by  gold-dazzled  self-seeking.  May  not 
Hauptmann  even  have  had  the  artistic  aim  of  pre- 
senting Montezuma  as  the  one  genuine  Christ-like 
figure  in  the  drama  ?  That  this  may  be  something  more 
than  mere  speculation  is  suggested  by  the  author's 
evident  sympathy  for  his  protagonist.  Montezuma 
is  a  lesser  Christ  crucified  by  men  calling  themselves, 
and  sincerely  believing  themselves,  Christians.  He 
is  the  strangely  soft  product  of  a  cannabalistic  cult, 
as  opposed  to  the  leader  Cortez,  harsh  son  of  a  re- 
ligion of  meekness.  Lift  the  symbol  into  higher 
regions  still,  above  nations  and  cults  and  ages,  and 
you  have  the  unending  pageant  of  human  dis- 
illusionment.   Montezuma  the  martvr  becomes  Man 


GERMANY  285 

the  seeker-martyr.  By  such  signs  as  these,  even 
allowing  for  the  personal  bias  and  coloring  that  is 
inherent  in  all  suggestive  interpretation,  Haupt- 
mann  was  looking  not  only  backward  when  he  wrote 
The  White  Redeemer^  but  was  regarding  the  present 
and  perhaps  doubting  the  future.  He  has  thus  not 
strayed  so  far  from  his  characteristic  plays  as  one 
might  at  first  blush  be  tempted  to  think;  his  human 
interests  are  strong  with  the  suggestion  of  contem- 
poraneity. It  is  not  at  all  impossible,  though  the 
idea  may  sound  far-fetched,  that  Hauptmann  wrote 
with  a  haunting  thought  of  the  late  war;  those  who 
are  fond  of  extracting  such  symbolization  will  find, 
if  they  seek  diligently  enough,  material  for  their 
pursuit.  However,  such  investigation  may  best  be 
left  to  those  who  are  so  minded. 

The  irony  of  the  piece  plays  almost  constantly 
over  the  action;  it  appears  at  once  in  Montezuma's 
inextinguishable  faith  and  follows  the  Emperor  to 
the  bitter  moment  when  he  is  forcibly  clothed  in  his 
regal  robes,  into  which  one  of  the  mocking  soldiers 
blows  his  nose.  There  are  moments  of  intense 
pathos,  as  for  example  the  final  interview  between 
the  ruler  and  his  brave  son,  in  which  both  vow 
themselves  to  a  defiant  death.  Effective  scenes  of 
debate,  of  dissension  in  council,  alternate  with  the 
tumult  of  color,  tempests  of  sound,  and  anguished 
silences  in  which  Montezuma  comes  to  realize  his 
unwitting  betrayal  of  his  people. 

Yet  the  movement  is  not,  on  the  whole,  essen- 
tially "dramatic."  Montezuma  is  a  psychological, 
rather  than  a  dramaturgic,  creation.  His  thoughts, 
not  his  deeds,  are  presented.  It  is  through  his  spoken 
emotions  that  he    wins   the  reader's  and   the  spec- 


286        THE  DRAMA  OF  TRAXSITKA' 

tator's  sympathy,  rather  than  through  acts  that 
translate  those  emotions.  (All  this,  not  so  much  to 
imply  inferiority  as  to  note  a  distinction  in  style.) 
Certain  figures  Hauptmann  has  touched  off  with  a 
happy  stroke,  while  others,  and  notably  Marina — 
Cortez'  paramour — are  merely  suggested  and  not 
made  clear. 

Now,  how  is  this  an  Expressionistic  work.''  Be- 
cause of  its  numerous  scenes.''  Scenic  discontinuity 
alone  cannot  make  Expressionism  in  the  restricted 
sense  of  the  new  German  experimenters,  else  Shake- 
speare would  be  the  central  Expressionist  of  them 
all.  Besides,  Hauptmann  does  not  here  play  with 
time  and  space.  Alontezuma.''  But  he  is  a  compel- 
ling psychological  creation  in  just  the  sense  that  the 
Expressionists  repudiate!  The  background?  But 
Hauptmann  uses  it  for  its  colorful  suggestion,  in- 
dependent of  the  purely  symbolic  practice  of  the 
Expressionists,  who  aim  at  the  generalized  cmotion- 
alization  of  the  inanimate  object.  The  poetry? 
But  it  is  all-too-monotonous  in  its  regularity,  and 
too  crystal  clear  for  "Expressionism."  Too  mature, 
shall  we  say?  Too  human?  Too  coherent?  Too 
intermediate?  All  these  things,  and  more,  from  the 
point  of  view  of  the  new  revokes.  Hauptmann,  one 
fears,  must  be  left  in  the  seclusion  of  his  own  pre- 
eminence. 

WALTER  HASENCLEVER 

Perhaps  the  most  widely  known  of  the  pure  Ex- 
pressionists in  the  drama  is  the  young  half-Jew,' 
Walter    Hasenclever,     born    on    July    8,    1890,    at 

'  See,  on  this  score.  Adolf  Bartels,  Die  deutsche  Dichtunn  der  Cegenuart,  page 
229.  In  all  that  Bartels  has  written  the  Jew  is  one  of  the  arch-villains  of  German 
literature,  together  with  the  Protestant  and  other  pet  animosities 


GERMANY  287 

••• 
Aachen.  He  has  studied  at  Oxford  University, 
England,  where  he  wrote  his  first  book.  "The  cost 
of  printing  it,"  he  has  written,  "I  won  at  poker." 
In  1909  he  proceeded  to  Lausanne,  thence  to  Leip- 
zig. He  has  traveled  in  Italy.  He  served  during 
the  war  as  an  interpreter,  purchaser,  and  kitchen- 
boy.  He  has  won  success  as  a  poet,  and  his  works 
for  the  stage  include  Der  Sohn^  which  was  completed 
in  1 9 14,  Antigone y  Die  Menschen^  Die  Entscheidung^ 
Der  Retter  (a  dramatic  poem),  and  Jenseits. 

As  the  writers  of  the  new  drama  differ  within  the 
sphere  of  their  common  revolt,  so  do  the  plays  of 
Hasenclever  differ  among  themselves.  At  times 
they  baffle  ready  comprehension — particularly  Die 
Menschen,  which,  suggestively  enough,  begins  and 
ends  in  a  graveyard,  and,  among  other  things,  makes 
an  excursion  into  a  madhouse  where  the  inmates 
crawd  about  in  lycanthropic  abandon.  At  others, 
as,  for  example,  Der  Sohn^  the  play  is  quite  coherent, 
and  for  all  its  strangeness  would  produce  undoubted 
effect  upon  a  contemporary  audience  of  a  certain 
sensitivity  to  experimental  novelty.  Whatever  the 
worth  that  may  ultimately  be  assigned  to  the  move- 
ment, it  has  already  earned,  then,  the  right  to  be 
examined,  and  the  investigation  is  productive 
enough  of  pleasure,  surprise,  bepuzzlement,  and  oc- 
casional frowns. 

Take,  for  beginning,  the  five-act  piece,  Der  Sohn. 
The  Son  was  begun  in  191 3,  and  published  in  the 
opening  year  of  the  great  conflict.  It  has,  inciden- 
tally, sold  like  a  popular  novel  into  the  thousands, 
and  the  reason  for  its  popularity  is  implicit  in  the 
very  title.  The  play,  like  the  movement  that  it 
represents,  is  a  revolt  of  the  sons  against  the  fathers. 


288        THE  DRAMA  OF  TRANSITION        * 

of  the  new  against  the  old.  The  son  stands  for 
everything  that  is  everlasting  change,  the  father  for 
all  that  is  philosophically  and  self-protectively  con- 
servative. Between  these,  despite  all  that  links 
them  to  each  other,  is  a  species  of  eternal  warfare, 
now  underground  and  muffled,  now  overt  and  im- 
placable. The  victory  is  always  to  the  new,  which 
in  its  turn  becomes  the  old  of  a  newer  generation, 
and  thus  onward  ad  infinitum.  An  old,  old  theme, 
this  struggle  of  the  emerging  new,  nor  has  Hasen- 
clever  brought  anything  thematically  novel  to  its 
unfolding;  the  novelty,  then,  lies  in  the  treatment; 
from  our  point  of  view,  plot  is  distinctly  secondary, 
as  perhaps  it  was  with  the  author.  Expressionism  is, 
from  its  very  title,  new  more  in  manner  than  in 
content,  though  a  thorough  change  in  the  one  im- 
plies a  change  in  the  other. 

The  Son  fails  in  his  examinations  and,  after  a 
talk  with  his  Instructor,  is  brought  by  his  thoughts 
to  the  brink  of  suicide;  a  sudden  reaction  is  wrought 
by  a  vision,  and  he  decides  to  live.  Now  that  life 
possesses  a  new  sweetness,  he  looks  with  different 
eyes  upon  the  Governess  who  serves  as  guardian 
over  him  during  his  father's  absence.  He  demands 
that  his  father  be  sent  for;  he  wishes  to  have  it  out 
with  his  parent  once  and  for  all. 

Act  Two:  a  love  episode  between  him  and  the 
Governess  is  interrupted  by  the  arrival  of  the  Father, 
whereupon  ensues  a  bitter — and  highly  effective — de- 
bate between  the  two  men,  ending  with  the  Father's 
decision  to  lock  the  boy  in  his  room.  The  Father,  a 
physician,  considers  his  son  temporarily  deranged 
by  a  fever,  so  strange  does  this  rebellious  talk  come 
from  a  child  hitherto  amenable   to  every  paternal 


GERMANY  289 

wish.  But  revolt,  as  well  as  love,  laughs  at  lock- 
smiths, and  the  same  friend  who  has  visited  the  Son 
in  the  previous  act  appears  now  to  the  strains  of  the 
chorus  in  Beethoven's  Ninth  Symphony  and  wafts 
the  Son  forth  through  an  open  window  to  lead  the 
revolt  of  the  world's  suppressed  sons. 

Act  Three:  A  society  of  youth  has  assembled  in 
annual  meeting  and  is  to  be  addressed  by  Cher- 
ubim, a  sublimated  stump-orator  eager  for  effect 
rather  than  for  sense.  Just  as  his  triumphant  speech 
is  about  to  be  delivered,  enter  the  Friend,  who 
challenges  Cherubim  and  all  he  stands  for.  Re- 
bellious youth,  it  seems,  has  differences  in  its  own 
ranks;  it  has  been  whispered  somewhere,  I  believe, 
that  there  are  fathers  "yo'J^g^^"  than  their  own 
sons.  The  upshot  of  the  Friend's  arrival  is  that 
instead  of  Cherubim  winning  a  rhetorical  triumph 
with  his  merely  epicurean  oration,  the  Son,  under 
the  hypnotic  influence  of  the  Friend,  delivers  a  rev- . 
olutionary  appeal;  the  society  for  the  propagation  of, 
joy  is  won  in  a  campaign  against  the  fathers.  "Death 
to  the  dead!"  becomes  the  slogan — a  phrase  deeper 
than  the  mere  paradox  that  at  first  appears.  The 
Son's  triumph  has  saved  his  own  life,  for  behind  the 
scenes  the  Friend  has  stood  ready  to  shoot  him  if 
he  should  fail  to  capture  the  sentiments  of  the 
society. 

Act  Four:  The  Son  surrenders  to  a  sentimental 
interlude  with  Adrienne,  a  daughter  of  joy.  He  is 
na'ive;  she  would  be  his  teacher;  for  the  nonce  his 
violent  speech  has  escaped  from  his  memory.  "What 
is  eight  hours  old  has  already  become  historical  to 
me."  But  the  Friend,  who  plays,  from  the  begin- 
ning,  Mephistopheles   to   the   Son's   Faust,   arrives 


290       THE  DRAMA  OF  TRANSITION 

with  the  news  that  he  hiiiiscH  has  informed  the 
Son's  father  of  the  escaped  child's  whereabouts. 
The  Father  has  sent  the  poHce  to  apprehend  the 
young  rebel.  And  now,  according  to  the  mysterious 
Friend,  comes  the  supreme  test.  Will  the  Son, 
leader  of  the  world's  revolting  sons,  slay  his  own 
father  if  that  tyrant  really  has  sent  the  police  upon 
his  trail?  The  promise  is  exacted  and  made;  and 
surely  enough  in  come  the  police,  to  whom,  without 
a  struggle,  the  Son  surrenders.  The  Friend,  his 
mission  now  fulfilled,  yearns  for  death,  the  vision 
of  which  blends  with  that  of  the  returning  Adrienne. 
"She  will  bring  me  annihilatitxi  in  a  drop  of  cham- 
pagne." 

Act  Five:  The  Father  and  the  Police-chief,  who 
is  also  a  father,  discuss  the  case  of  the  Son.  The 
first  is  the  obdurate  Roman  parent,  kindly  in  his 
own  way,  but  firm  in  his  interpretation  of  filial 
duty  and  paternal  authority;  not  so  the  other,  who 
counsels  leniency.  Led  back  to  his  father,  the  Son 
determined  if  necessary  to  slay  a  tyrant  who  refuses 
him  liberty,  assumes  the  attitude  of  judge  rather 
than  defendant;  again  the  old  debate  is  resumed, 
with  increasing  fury  and  at  the  very  moment,  it 
seems,  when  the  Son  is  ready  to  shoot,  the  Father  is 
stricken  with  apoplexy.  A  short  epilogue  is  spoken 
(in  rhymed  verse)  by  the  Son,  who  proclaims  a 
mission  in  which  sacrifice  fructifies  deeds: 

Denn  dem  Lebendigen  mich  zu  verbiinden, 
Hab*  ich  die  Macht  des  Todes  nicht  gescheut. 
Jetzt  hochste  Kraft  in  Menschen  zu  verkiinden, 
Zur  hochsten  Freiheit,  ist  mein  Herz  erneut! 

On  this  note  of  the  defiance  of  death  in  the  spreading 
of  a  libertarian  gospel,  the  play  comes  to  an  end~. 


GERMANY  291 

Governess  and  Son  walk  hand  in  hand  off  the  stage, 
leaving  the  corpse  alone  in  the  middle  of  the  room. 
As  to  the  technical  aspects  of  the  play,  there  is 
much  to  be  said.  Note  at  the  very  start  the  return 
to  the  five-act  form.  Note,  too,  that  there  is  the 
occasional  use  of  rhymed  verse.  As  we  have  already 
learned,  the  soliloquy  is  self-conscious;  indeed,  there 
is  a  repeated  use  of  stage  figures  of  speech  that  seems 
to  attest  an  added  wish  of  the  author  to  impress  the 
theatrical  atmosphere.  Thus,  at  the  opening  of  the 
play,  when  the  Son  wishes  to  be  left  alone,  his  in- 
structor asks  him:  "What  are  you  going  to  do 
now?"    Whereupon  the  Son  replies: 

Probably  indulge  in  a  soliloquy.  I  must  have  a  talk 
with  myself.  You  know  formerly  this  method  was  de- 
spised. But  I've  never  found  it  blameworthy  to  kneel 
down  before  my  own  pathos,  for  I  know  how  poignantly 
real  are  my  joy  and  my  sorrow.  Ever  since  my  earliest 
childhood  I  have  learned  to  love  the  solitude  around  me, 
until  it  spoke  to  me  in  tones.  Even  to-day  I  can  go  into 
the  garden  and  stand  before  a  few  trees,  directing  a 
symphony  and  playing  the  tenor  of  my  own  opera.  .  .  . 
Don't  you  know  that  feeling? 

The  Instructor,  a  workaday  soul  like  ourselves,  is 
embarrassed  for  reply;  here  is  something  not  in  his 
books,  so  all  he  can  say  is,  "We  live  on  an  upper 
floor."  W^e  have,  in  this  paragraph  of  the  Son,  a 
hint  of  what  is,  as  we  have  said,  coming  to  be  called 
the  presentational  method.  The  Son  not  only  em- 
phasizes the  fact  that  he  is  an  actor,  but  fairly  states 
the  dramatist's  apology  or  justification  for  the  use 
of  soliloquy;  he  turns  commentator,  critic,  theorist, 
and,    what   is   more,   is   practically    addressing   the 


292        THE  DRAMA  OF  TRANSITION 

audience,  though  well  within  his  role.  The  mood  is 
the  "exalted"  one  so  sought  by  the  F.xpressionists. 
Examine  the  third  scene  ot  the  second  act;  the 
Son  has  been  locked  up  and  despairs  in  a  brief 
soliloquy.  Suddenly  his  friend  appears  outside  the 
window,  announcing  that  he  has  circumvented  all 
precautions.     The  Son  is  overwhelmed  with  joy. 

Son:    It's  you!    You  love  me!    Good  God!    God! 

Friend  {halj  of  him  showing  through  the  window): 
Have  I  come  at  the  right  hour? 

Sox:  Can  anyone  yet  befriend  mc,  as  forsaken  as 
I  am? 

Friend:  Have  you  forgotten  that  Beethoven  lives? 
You  no  longer  recall  that  we  sang  in  the  Chorus  of  the 
Ninth  Symphony?  Would  you  not  embrace  all  man- 
kind? Up,  my  youth,  it  is  daybreak!  .  .  .  Let  us 
wander  amidst  the  echoes  of  joy  as  once,  after  the  con- 
cert hall  was  closed,  we  wandered  together  into  the  night. 

As  they  escape  through  the  window,  the  spec- 
tator beholds  the  lights  of  the  distant  citv.  Over 
the  wind  come  faintly  wafting  the  strains  of  the 
finale  of  the  Ninth  Symphony,  tenor  solo  and  male 
chorus: 

Froh  wie  seine  Sonnen  fliegen 
Durch  des  Himmels  pracht'gen  Plan, 
Laufet,  Briider,  eure  Bahn, 
Freudig  wie  ein  Held  zum  Siegen. 

And  "joyous  as  a  hero  to  victory"  the  Son  leaves  on 
his  high  purpose. 

At  the  end  of  the  third  act  the  programme  of  the 
Ninth  Symphony  chorus  yields  to  the  war-cry  of  the 
Marseillaise.     The  Prince  himself,  won  over  bv  the 


GERMANY  293 

Son's  eloquence,  leaps  upon  a  table  and  starts  to 
sing: 

Aux  armes,  citoyens! 

Formez  vos  bataillons! 

Marchons!  Marchons! 

We  have  found,  thus  far,  a  medley  of  the  realistic 
drama  (the  hot  debate  between  father  and  son), 
the  verse  play,  the  opera.  Once  more,  at  the  end 
of  the  fourth  act,  when  death  seems  to  beckon  this 
time  to  the  Friend,  since  his  mission  in  directing 
the  Son's  actions  is  at  an  end,  there  is  a  self-con- 
scious soliloquy,  with  a  critical  remark  seeking  to 
explain  and  justify.  "Soliloquies  before  death  are 
frequent,"  he  tells  himself.  It  is  the  somewhat 
hazy  figure  of  this  Friend  that  imparts  to  the  play 
the  character  of  a  quasi-mystical  drama.  The 
"raisonneur"  is  not  dead;  he  lives  again  in  con- 
temporary drama,  now  frankly  enough,  as  in  Mol- 
nar's  The  Devil^  now  in  such  another  avatar  of 
Mephistopheles  as  this  selfsame  Friend.  The  rem- 
iniscence of  Faust  is  not  due  solely  to  critical  per- 
spicacity; it  is  suggested  by  the  dramatist  himself,  in 
yet  another  passage  of  the  play  that  indicates  the 
author's  desire  to  impress  upon  us  the  essential 
artificiality  of  his  medium.  The  Son  has  just  re- 
cited a  rhymed  soliloquy  of  some  seventy  verses, 
when  the  Friend  mysteriously  appears. 

Friend:    I  heard  that  you  had  failed  in  your  examina- 
tions.   Were  you  about  to  commit  suicide? 
Son:     To  be  brief — yes. 
Friend:     Well,  why  didn't  you? 
Son:     I  decided  to  live. 
Friend*.    You  owe  your  life  to  a  plagiarism  of  Faust. 


294        THE  DRAMA  OF  TR.*\NSI  FION 

Aren't  you  allowed  to  read  Goethe  yet?  Does  your 
father  at  least  let  you  go  to  theatre? 

The  latter-day  Mephistophelcs,  however,  tempts  his 
Faust,  not  with  women,  but  with  ideas.  Before  the 
end  of  the  play  has  been  reached,  it  is  not  only  the 
fathers  against  whom  the  sons  of  the  world  are  to 
revolt,  but  the  entire  family  system.  The  char- 
acters of  the  play  are,  as  may  easily  be  seen  from 
what  has  been  written,  types  rather  than  indi- 
viduals; the  Friend,  in  addition,  is  a  vague  type, 
tenuous,  suggesting  even  an  intellectual  attribute  ol 
the  Son  himself,  and  trom  such  a  point  of  view  to  be 
considered  as  a  complementary  self,  somewhat  in 
the  manner  of  Leandro  and  Crispin  in  Benavente's 
sparkling  apologue,  Los  hitaeses  Creados. 

The  Expressionists,  having  disavowed  psychology, 
would  logically  have  little  use  for  character  in  the 
realistic  sense  of  the  word.  If  Hasenclever's  people 
are  schematic,  symbolic  personages,  embodying  the 
various  postulates  of  the  author's  inner  debates, 
this  is  not  through  dramaturgic  deficiency;  it  is  part 
of  his  avowed  manner.  The  same  must  be  said  of 
his  scenes,  which  may  be  coherent  enough  when  his 
purpose  seems  to  demand  it;  usually,  and  more 
notably  in  his  later  work,  they  are  capricious,  shift- 
ing like  the  imagery  of  thought  rather  than  pro- 
gressing in  conformity  with  the  unity  of  place  en- 
forced by  the  exigencies  of  the  modern  stage. 

The  Expressionist  may  repudiate  the  thesis  play 
and  speak  of  the  substitution  of  ideas  for  theses 
(nor  is  the  distinction  new,  for  there  is  a  genuine 
difference  between  the  problem  play  and  the  thesis 
play,  though   the  terms  are  often  employed   inter- 


GERMANY  295 

changeably).^  Yet  such  a  play  as  T)er  Sohn  is  a 
thesis  play,  or  very  near  it.  Its  intent  is  unmis- 
takable; to  be  sure,  we  have  a  certain  feeling  that 
the  dramatist  has  tried  to  be  fair;  he  has  presented 
good  fathers  (the  police  chief)  as  well  as  frivolous 
sons;  the  name  of  the  play,  however,  and  its  course, 
plainly  reveal  the  author's  sympathies.  To  attempt 
an  appraisal  of  its  values  would  be  premature,  as 
it  would  be  in  the  case  of  the  other  plays  to  which 
we  shall  presently  come,  because  the  medium  is 
new  and  one  must  allow  for  mental  habits.  Several 
readings  seem  to  indicate  that  the  play  would 
easily  interest  a  trained  audience;  it  has  high  mo- 
ments, high  purpose,  and  its  author  is  plainly  an 
intellectual  force. 

Antigone^  which  followed  Der  Sohn,  owes  only  its 
material  and  its  personages  to  Sophocles.  In  the 
hands  of  Hasenclever  the  plot  acquires  a  pacifistic 
passion;  Antigone  blames  herself  for  having  dwelt 
in  passive  pleasure  while  the  war  just  ended  raged 
in  its  path. 

Ich  klage  mich  an,  die  niedrichste  Magd  von  alien, 
dass  ich  lebte  und  wusste:  Wir  toten  uns; 
dass  keine  Stimme  von  Gottes  Himmel 
mich  erweckte  als  Retterin. 
Ich  klage  mich  an,  dass  in  meine  Kissen 
nicht  die  Wunden  eiterten  hinein, 
dass  ich  schwebte  auf  bliihenden  Girlanden, 
solange  ein  Mensch  noch  hungrig  war. 
Ich  klage  mich  an — ich  habe  Gates  genossen, 
doch   nichts   Gutes  getan,  sonst  waren   Meschen 
nicht  feind. 


'The  thesis  play,  for  example   elucidates  a  foregone  conclusion;  the  problem 
play  presents,  rather  than  solves,  an  issue. 


296       THE  DRAMA  OF  TRANSITION 

The  chorus  of  the  poor  (and  Greek-like  choruses, 
much  transformed,  are  common  in  Expressionist 
drama)  proclaims  the  new  day: 

"Friede  alien  Noten. 
Friede  allem  Leid. 
Schon  auf  Morgcnroten 
griisst  die  neue  2^it. 

Antigone  is  the  leader  of  her  people,  even  in  her 
chains.  Schneider  complains  that  it  is  too  the- 
atrical, that  its  language,  especially  that  of  King 
Kreon,  is  too  rhetorical,  and  that  the  inartistic 
parallel  between  the  king  and  Wilhelm  II  injures 
the  artistry.  Yet  he  finds  in  the  play,  which  he 
considers  superior  to  Der  So/in y  a  wealth  ot  deep 
passion,  a  great  longing  for  justice  and  human 
solidarity. 

From  now  on  Hasenclever's  plays  grow  misty, 
like  an  ill-focussed  slide  upon  a  murky  screen.  Take, 
as  instance,  Die  Aienschen  (191 8),  another  five-act 
play,  but  almost  distinct  enough  from  Der  Sohn 
to  have  come  from  another  hand.  Dialogue  has 
been  reduced  to  a  semi-comprehensible  minimum; 
what  is  more,  there  is  no  logic  to  the  act-divisions, 
and  such  coherency  as  binds  them  must  be  deduced, 
although  a  scene  here  and  there  adheres  to  some 
cogent  principle.  The  technique  is  fairly  Mari- 
nettian  in  its  Futurism;  time  and  space  are  the  play- 
wright's toys  and  even  severed  heads  may  speak. 
The  whole  flickers  past  the  vision  like  a  badly 
edited  film,  and  the  words  click  like  the  telegrapher's 
key.  Der  Sohn  is  as  a  set  of  kindergarten  blocks 
compared  to  the  Expressionistic  filming  of  Die 
Menschen.     As  to  the  plot,  I  offer,  in  all  humility, 


GERMANY  297 

such  a  narrative  as  two  puzzled  readings  have 
yielded  up  from  the  mad  succession  ot  scenes. 
Alexander,  rising  from  his  grave,  meets  a  murderer 
who  cries  aloud  his  crime,  at  the  same  time  passing 
to  him  a  sack  with  the  head  of  the  murdered  person. 
The  murderer  descends  into  the  grave  and  Alex- 
ander throws  earth  upon  him,  leaving  then  upon  a 
series  of  adventures;  he  comes  upon  a  couple  of 
lovers,  the  lass  crying  that  she  has  betrayed  her 
swain;  he  enters  a  cafe  in  which  a  murder  is  being 
discussed;  through  deception  and  robbery  he  stalks, 
in  high  places  and  low,  perhaps  in  quest  of  himself, 
for  at  the  end  of  the  first  act  he  asks,  "Who  am  I?" 
There  are  episodes  with  prostitutes,  gloomy  prog- 
nostications by  a  fortune-teller,  made  to  the  youth 
and  lass  of  the  first  act,  and  surely  enough  we  next 
find  them  in  the  doctor's  office,  he  suff"ering  from  the 
unmentionable  disease  and  she  big  with  child,  yet 
winsome  enough  to  attract  the  physician.  Now 
comes  Alexander  to  save  the  maid  from  suicide  and 
the  youth  as  well,  for  the  next  scene  shows  them  all 
in  an  opera  box.  "Where  are  we?"  asks  the  maid. 
"Resurrection,"  answers  Alexander. 

The  following  acts  bring  like  adventure  of  like 
significance.  "Who  are  you?"  asks  the  father  of  a 
little  girl  whose  mother  Alexander  has  befriended. 
"I  am  looking  for  myself,"  is  the  reply.  "Mensch!" 
(i.  e.,  human  being)  is  the  father's  monosyllabic 
exclamation.  Then  comes  a  hospital,  with  an  al- 
most unmentionably  cynical  episode  of  a  child's 
birth;  in  a  later  scene  the  cynical  doctor  is  himself 
done  away  with  for  his  money;  there  is  a  court  trial 
in  which  Alexander  is  found  guilty  of  the  murder 
committed,  persumably,  by  the  man  who  replaced 


298        THE  DRAMA  OF  TRANSITION 

him  in  the  grave.  In  vain  he  offers  evidence,  re- 
pentance; "All  are  murderers!"  he  cries  out,  and  is 
thereupon  sent  to  the  madhouse.  He  returns  at 
length  to  the  grave,  the  man  he  left  there  comes  out, 
Alexander  gives  him  back  the  sack,  empty,  and 
descends  into  the  tomb  as  the  murderer,  stretching 
out  his  arms,  cries,  "1  love!"  Gruesome,  path- 
ological, grotesque.  But  art?  One  recalls  a  useful 
distinction,  insisted  upon  somewhere  by  Wilson 
Follet:  art  is  not  merely  sell-expression,  but  self- 
communication.  Hasenclever  doubtless  expresses 
something  or  other  in  Die  Me7ischc)i;  he  is  imbued, 
as  are  his  fellows,  with  a  sense  ol  our  common  guilt, 
our  need  of  merging  that  guilt  in  an  all-cmbracing 
love;  as  to  what  he  communicates  needs  further 
thought.  Plays  such  as  these,  it  seems,  demand 
discussion  in  terms  of  Freuil;  indeed,  an  American 
analyst,  Dr.  Brill,  in  his  hitest  book,  suggests  a 
comparison  between  the  auto-eroticism  of  the  infant 
life  and  the  contemporary  artists  whose  composi- 
tions are  understood  only  by  themselves.  The  nor- 
mal child  as  it  grows  older  learns  the  proper  trans- 
ference of  its  affections  to  an  outside  object;  cor- 
responding art  likewise  communicates  the  author's 
emotions  in  degree.  Mere  expression  stops  upon 
the  threshold  of  the  shut-in,  the  self-preoccupied  per- 
sonality. Of  course  such  comparisons  properly  con- 
cern only  the  genesis  of  a  work  of  art;  they  cannot 
replace  the  final  aesthetic  criteria.  And  it  is  just  this 
aesthetic  sense  that  Hasenclever  so  amuses  and 
puzzles  in  Die  Mensc/ien.^ 

Der  Retter  was  written  previous  to  Die  Menschen^ 

>  The  psychoanalysts  no  doubt  could  tell  us  pretty  things  about  the  constant 
use  of  severed  heads  by  these  writers.     We  might  call  it  the  John-tbe-Baptiat 
complex  1" 


GERMANY  299 

in  1 91 5,  and  not  unnaturally  deals  with  the  prob- 
lem of  those  days.  The  King,  his  Minister,  the 
Field  Marshal,  and  the  Poet  are  the  chief  figures, 
with  a  vision  of  Saint  Paul  lending  a  mystic  touch 
and  a  grand  apotheosis  in  which  the  Queen  appears. 
The  Poet  is  a  man  of  peace  and  would  work  his 
way  with  the  King,  who  feels  for  him,  but  national 
necessity  forces  the  monarch  to  place  all  power  into 
the  hands  of  the  Marshal,  who  demands  and  re- 
ceives the  Hfe  of  the  Poet.  Essentially  the  play, 
which  Hasenclever  calls  a  dramatic  poem,  is  social, 
pacifist,  poetically  Christian.  It  is  written  with  a 
high  intensity  that  at  times  attains  to  eloquence; 
music,  light,  and  scenic  effect  play  parts  analogous 
to  those  in  Der  Sohn  and  in  the  new  play,  Jenseits\ 
as  in  a  moment  we  shall  see.  The  author  is  very 
evidently  fond  of  the  debate  as  a  dramatic  tool, 
and  no  doubt  this  answers  a  need  felt  by  him  as  a 
critic  of  society.  Again  it  is  worth  while  calling 
attention  to  thesis  implications  of  both  theme  and 
treatment. 

Jenseits  (1920)  is  less  easy  to  understand  than 
Der  Sohn,  but  not  quite  so  baffling  as  Die  Menschen. 
In  any  event  it  is  a  play  in  simple  language  that 
almost  eludes  understanding.  Hasenclever  is  not 
an  abstruse  writer;  his  style  is  usually  clear  in  ex- 
pression; it  is  the  combination  of  events  and  the 
sequence  of  images  that  alternately  attract  and  re- 
pel the  critic.  The  technique  here  is  largely  that  of 
the  presentational  method;  for  recent  psychology  in 
the  drama  it  substitutes  a  new  psychic  suggestiveness; 
at  times  the  dialogue  (or  the  monologue)  is  naivete 
of  a  medieval  order.  There  are  but  two  persons  in 
the  play,  Raul  and  Jeane.     In  the  other  plays  we 


300        THE  DRAMA  OF  TRAxNSITION 

have  considered  there  are  stage  directions;  here  they 
are  reduced,  as  are  the  personages,  to  a  minimum. 
The  place  of  action  is  "the  house,"  and  the  various 
scenes  take  place  in  different  parts  of  the  house, 
now  at  the  window,  now  in  a  room,  again  near  a 
telephone  or  on  a  bed.  Perhaps  Jeane  is  the  eternal 
woman,  true  to  her  first  husband  and  to  her  child 
rather  than  to  Raul,  the  eternal  man,  slaying  love 
through  very  excess,  that  he  may  be  free  of  its 
fetters. 

The  "plot"  of  Beyond  is  perhaps  implied  by  such 
an  interpretation.  The  dramatist's  means  are  char- 
acteristic. The  very  opening,  for  example,  shows 
Jeane  at  the  window,  talking  to  herself: 

This  is  my  house.  This  is  my  window.  This  is  the 
sky.  The  sun  is  shining.  I  know  that  I  am  alive.  I  am 
happy.  I  am  beloved.  {She  takes  a  couple  of  roses.) 
Summer  is  coming.  Yesterday  was  Sunday.  When 
Sirius  rises,  it  is  night.  Night,  when  I  kiss.  Night,  when 
I  love.  I  am  born.  I  am  with  thee.  No  garment  hides 
me,  no  veil.  I  stand  naked  before  thee.  Only  a  few 
hours.  Time  is  eternal.  Come  soon.  Come  again.  I 
love  thee.  {She  opens  the  window.)  This  is  my  house. 
This  is  my  window.  These  are  flowers  in  my  hand.  If 
they  could  feel  as  I  feel!  My  friend!  My  beloved!  My 
husband. 

Her  husband,  however,  is  killed  in  an  accident, 
and  instead,  there  comes  his  friend,  Raul.  Thus 
begins  the  course  of  their  love,  which  Jeane  is  soon 
to  repudiate  as  an  act  of  madness  and  grief  on  her 
part.  The  coils,  however,  tighten  around  them  both, 
and  this  way  and  that  they  are  torn  in  the  conflict 
of  their  emotions.  The  presence  of  the  husband 
returns  to  hover  over  them  and  add  to  their  con- 


GERMANY  301 

fusion.  A  child  forecasts  its  coming,  and  serves  to 
divide  rather  than  unite  them.  Raul  goes  mad. 
"Let  the  world  crash  to  ruin!  I  preach  annihilation 
in  my  name.  .  .  .  Free!  I  am  my  own  judge. 
The  world  belongs  to  me.  Love  is  death!"  Yet 
again  he  appeals  to  Jeane,  who  literally  tells  him  to 
take  everything  but  "spare  my  child!"  Her  greater 
allegiance,  however,  is  to  the  child,  and  when  Raul 
sees  this,  he  stabs  her  even  as  he  is  kissing  her. 
Whereupon,  according  to  the  stage  directions,  "in- 
visible hands  bear  off  the  house.  The  walls  noise- 
lessly collapse,  the  various  objects  sink  into  the 
depths,  the  chandelier  sways  on  high.  The  window 
in  the  background  disappears."  Raul's  head  is 
bathed  in  a  light  that  seems  to  issue  from  his  own 
forehead.  "I  see  the  light.  I  see  into  Life.  I  see 
into  the  kingdom  of  all  things  transitory.  For  the 
last  time  I  have  been  a  human  being.  I  am  illumined. 
I  am  ready."     Curtain. 

It  is  interesting  to  note  a  strange  blending  of  the 
ancient  with  the  futuristic  technique  in  the  course  of 
these  short  five  acts.  We  have  heard  Jeane  solil- 
oquize, we  have  heard  her  ask  in  melodramatic  ac- 
cents that  her  child  be  spared;  so,  too,  there  is  (as 
in  other  plays  of  Hasenclever)  the  old  device  of 
transmitting  information  across  the  footlights.  On 
the  other  hand,  to  companion  such  effects  as  speak- 
ing heads^  (and  did  not  a  certain  Will  Shakespeare 
employ  them  in  Macbeth?)  there  is  the  material 
representation  of  psychic  effects  that  Marinetti  has 
tried  to  build  into  independent  plays  made  up  of 
inanimate  objects.    So  here,  in  the  first  scene  of  the 

'  Compare  the  scene  in  Wedekind's  FriXhliv.gs  Erwachtn,  in  which  the  boy 
comes  out  of  his  grave,  with  his  own  head  under  his  arm,  for  a  taJk  with  his  old 
schoolmate.     Bartels  has  called  Der  Sohn  an  example  of  immature  Wedekindism. 


302        THE  DRAMA  OF   TRANSITION 

fourth  act,  "the  moon  fills  the  room  with  spots. 
The  various  pieces  of  furniture  assume  faces.  Be- 
hind the  wall  appear  the  silhouettes  of  beckoning 
arms    and    legs." 

Hasenclever  is  not  an  isolated  phenomenon;  he- 
is  a  popular  member  of  a  groping  group  that  is  more 
positive  in  its  reaction  against  previous  methods 
than  in  its  advance  toward  anything  like  definite 
accomplishment.  He  is  not,  in  these  plays,  national; 
the  milieu  is  everywhere  in  general,  the  core  of  his 
feelings  is  broadly  human  and  universal.  Neither 
is  he,  it  may  be  added,  erotic,  though  persons  with 
a  penchant  for  psychoanalyzing  literature  mav  de- 
tect the  symptoms  of  certain  "complexes".  Indeed, 
Der  Sohn  would  by  these  students  be  referred  to  the 
(Edipus  cycle  of  literary  manifestations.'  In  com- 
pany of  most  dramatists  who  write  with  a  purpf)se, 
he  lacks  humor.  Yet  even  as  the  Italian  Futurists, 
for  all  their  overemphasis  upon  subordinate  details, 
are  not  to  be  dismissed  without  a  fair  examination, 
so  the  wildest  of  Hasenclever's  creations  may  yield 
— together  with  the  other  new  German  dramatists 
— a  tithe  of  permanent  gain,  a  new  flexibilitv,  a  new 
suggestive  power,  to  the  dramatist  and  the  theatre 
that  live  on,  above  the  welter  of  "isms"  and  "ologies" 
in  the  upper  regions  of  art. 

GEORG  KAISER 

That  the  Expressionists  form  a  loosely  allied 
group  rather  than  a  concerted  reaction  or  a  cen- 
tralized movement,  is  further  emphasized  by  con- 
sideration of  some  of  the  more  striking  members 

'  I  am  sure  that  some  German  student  will  soon  write  an  essay  upon  Tht  CEdipus 
Situation  in  the  New  Drama.    There  is  abundant  materiall 


GERMANY  303 

of  the  nucleus.     And  there  are  groups  within  the 
group,  as  witness  the  Aktion  and  the  Sturm. 

Kaiser  has  been  called  a  number  of  names  at 
home  and  abroad.  Financial  difficulties  (so  readily 
solved  in  his  plays,  thick  with  millionaires,  banks 
and  floating  notes)  brought  him  a  couple  of  years 
ago  into  notoriety,  and  it  was  even  suggested  by 
part  of  the  German  press  that  he  needed  seclusion 
in  a  sanitarium  rather  than  punishment  behind  the 
bars.  Later,  when  his  Von  Morgens  bis  Mitternachts 
was  put  into  English,  The  Morning  Post  of  London 
made  the  discovery  that  Kaiser  was  a  "Bolshevik 
dramatist," — a  judgment  and  a  phrase  that  means 
nothing,  either  to  art  in  general  or  with  special  ref- 
erence to  Kaiser's  plays.  The  man  may  be,  as  Kerr 
of  the  Berliner  Tageblatt  has  said,  half-Expressionist 
and  half-bluffer,  but  he  has  written  some  things  that, 
if  as  a  whole  they  reveal  the  influence  of  Ibsen, 
Wedekind  (his  Rektor  Kleist  is  another  edition  of 
Frilhlings  Ervoachen),  and  Sternheim,  in  turn  will 
influence  the  younger  generation. 

Even  Kaiser's  "bluffs,"  if  such  they  really  are — 
for  example  Europa,  a  "play  and  dance"  in  five 
acts,  or  Der  Gerettete  Alkibiades  {Alcibiades  De- 
livered)— contain  undoubted  moments  of  beauty; 
and  if  no  single  play  can  be  pointed  to  as  an  im- 
maculate accomplishment,  there  is  in  the  sum  of  his 
work  a  suggestion  of  a  novel  nuance  in  the  con- 
temporary drama.  There  may  be  a  question  as  to 
whether  that  nuance  is  rather  pictorial  than  essen- 
tially dramatic;  as  to  whether  Kaiser  has  any 
definite  knowledge  of  what  he  is  striving  after,  or, 
as  I  am  inclined  to  think,  he  is  roving  about  half 
lost,  like  so  many  of  his  fellows.     In  any  event,  he 


304       THE  DRAMA  OF  TRANSITION 

is  not  the  mystifier  that  Kokoschka  phiinly  seems  to 
be;  if  he  is  not  always  clear,  one  feels  that  he  ac- 
tually is  expressing  something  and  in  his  own  way. 
Call  him  what  you  will,  discover  the  origins  of  his 
work — and  a  varied,  wavering  line  his  labors  trace 
— in  whatever  impulse  you  please,  the  man  has 
intuitions  of  beauty  in  the  drama.  He  is  intense  in 
spots,  rather  than  complete;  he  is  a  playwright  of 
fascinating  fragments;  in  continuing  and  elaborating 
the  "speed-technique"  of  Wcdekind  he  has  sac- 
rificed the  continuity  to  which  we  have  long  been 
accustomed.  But  not  merely  for  the  sake  of  cover- 
ing more  ground  or  in  an  impatient  desire  for  an 
art  of  outbursts.  Kaiser,  in  his  more  thorough-going 
pieces,  seeks  something  of  the  expressional  power  of 
music.  If  not  every  word  be  grasped,  not  every  idea 
linked  to  the  remaining  phrases  in  a  chain  of  logic, 
little  harm  is  done.  These  scenes,  these  people 
upon  the  stage  before  us  are  visions,  emotions  made 
visible.  It  is  the  succession  of  emotions,  the  surge 
of  feeling,  that  counts. 

Among  the  new  dramatists  Kaiser  "is  relative^' 
old.  He  was  born  on  November  25,  1878,  at  Mad^»- 
burg,  and  followed  early  in  the  footsteps  of  his 
father  as  a  merchant.  Business  took  him  for  three 
years  to  Buenos  Aires,  and  on  his  return  he  married. 
His  plays  already  number  at  least  a  score.  The 
Expressionists,  even  those  that  belong  to  the  out- 
and-out  ranks,  are  none  too  consistent  in  their  pro- 
duction; clarity  and  obscurity  sit  side  by  side  in 
the  same  play,  let  alone  the  list  of  their  writings. 
So  that  in  the  case  of  the  half-Expressionist  Kaiser 
we  are  not  surprised  to  find  pieces  ranging  from  the 
transparent  action  of  Das  Frauenopfer  (which  may. 


GERMANY  305 

with  close  approximation  to  its  actual  contents,  be 
translated  into  the  banal  title  A  Woman  s  Sacrifice) 
to  the  murkiness  of  From  Morn  to  Midnight  and  yet 
again  to  the  alternate  light  and  shade  of  Europa. 
Nor  do  these  varying  manners  follow  any  chrono- 
logical order.  Das  Frauenopfer,  for  example,  be- 
longs to  191 8,  being  preceded  (1917)  by  Die  Koralle, 
an  interesting  bit  of  pure  Expressionism  (if  there  be 
any  such  thing)  and  followed  by  Gas  of  the  same 
year  and  Holle  Weg  Erde  of  the  next.  A  zig-zag 
spirit,  then,  both  in  the  line  traced  by  his  entire 
output  and  in  the  rhythm  of  the  separate  pieces. 

Die  Judische  Wit'-jje  (191 1,  The  Jewish  Widow)  is 
a  Biblical  play  on  the  Judith  theme;  Die  Burger 
von  Calais  (1914)  is  likewise  historical,  going  back 
to  the  tale  of  the  six  victims  demanded  by  Edward 
III.,  for  England;  Das  Fraiienopjer  is  part  history 
and  part  fiction,  recounting  the  story  of  Madame 
La  Valette,  who,  saving  her  husband  after  he  has 
been  condemned  to  death  following  the  downfall  of 
Napoleon,  saves  him  once  again — and  by  the  same 
subterfuge  of  putting  on  masculine  apparel — when 
the  soldiery  comes  in  pursuit  of  him.  The  play  has 
more  than  the  significance  of  an  altered  historical 
tale;  it  seeks,  not  too  successfully,  to  contrast  the 
sacrificing  spirit  of  womankind  with  the  narrow, 
jealous  heart  of  man.  La  Valette,  for  example, 
learning  that  his  wife,  having  taken  his  place  in  the 
cell  when  he  walked  out  in  feminine  garb,  dallied 
under  compulsion  with  the  guards  so  as  to  give  him 
more  time  in  which  to  make  good  his  escape,  bursts 
into  possessive  fury.  But  the  plot  is  too  strained 
for  reality;  it  is  too  obvious  for  symbolism;  it  falls 
between   two  stools  into  a  species  of  grotesquerie. 


306       THE  DRAMA  OF  TRANSITION 

Two  years  before,  in  Konilantin  Sirobel^  known  also 
as  Der  Zentaiir^  Kaiser  had  written  a  play  which 
blended  reality  and  fantasy  in  even  less  separable 
fashion.  The  first  half  of  the  play  is  in  what  for 
him  we  may  call  the  realistic  fashion.  We  divine 
that  Strobel,  engaged  to  Judith,  has  been  straying 
with  a  common  house-servant.  And  we  divine  also, 
though  less  clearly,  that  in  this  seemingly  ignoble 
act  was  the  germ  of  something  that  was  meant  to 
be  noble.  But  the  relation  between  end  and  begin- 
ning is  not  clear. 

Between  these  plays  and  the  others,  however 
much  one  may  discern  in  the  first  type  signs  of 
Kaiser's  more  P'xpressionistic  moods,  there  is  a 
fairly  distinct  line  of  cleavage.  Vet  little  is  gained 
by  such  distinction.  Either  Kaiser  is  comprehen- 
sible or  he  is  not;  either  he  affects  the  spectator  or 
not.  It  is  easy  enough  to  show  just  where  and 
wherein  he  is  of  this  dramaturgic  persuasion  or 
other,  and  all  that  is  required  for  such  a  purpose  is 
a  decent  library  of  dramatic  criticism,  a  pair  of 
good  eyes  and  the  infinite — if  none  too  fruitful — 
patience  of  the  pedant.  More  to  the  present  pur- 
pose is  Kaiser's  quest  for  beauty.  For  once  and 
again  he  seems  to  gain  it  through  a  plastic  use  of 
the  human  figure  (in  the  individual  and  in  the 
mass)  to  express  fundamental  spiritual  reactions. 
Let  us  examine  first  the  piece  that  introduced  him 
to  the  English-speaking  public,  Von  Morgetis  bis 
Mitternachts^  both  in  London  and  in  New  York. 

From  Morn  to  Midnight  has  little  plot;  plot  is  so 
secondary  to  the  Expressionists  that  they  are  quite 
as  willing  to  remake  ancient  plavs  as  to  borrow 
more  modern  tales,  much  less  devise  fables  of  their 


GERMANY  307 

own.  Not  the  plot  but  the  immediately  com- 
municated thrill  of  emotion  is  the  thing.  Here  we 
have  a  married  bank  clerk,  who  is  fascinated  by  a 
woman  whom  he  believes  accessible,  and  for  whom 
he  steals  sixty  thousand  from  his  institution,  only 
to  find  that  she  is  not  for  sale.  He  has  made  the 
leap  and  now  he  must  plunge  on  to  the  bitter  end. 
Before  he  does  so  he  visits  his  home — a  bourgeois 
domestic  interior — and  upsets  it  by  his  sudden  leav- 
ing, before  eating  his  noonday  meal.  The  break 
with  routine  kills  his  mother,  but  he  receives  her 
death  with  a  cold,  Kaiserian  remark:  "Daran  stirbt 
sie,  weil  einer  einmal  vor  dem  Mittagessen  weggeht" 
("For  once  in  his  life  a  man  goes  out  before  his  meal 
— and  that  kills  her"). 

The  excitement  that  the  woman  from  Italy  has 
denied  him  the  fugitive  will  seek  elsewhere — at  the 
howling  enthusiasm  of  a  six-day  cycle  race,  which 
he  showers  with  prodigal  prizes;  at  a  high-class  res- 
taurant, at  a  Salvation  Army  hall,  where  confession 
and  repentance  may  ease  his  soul  of  the  day's  many 
burdens.  But  the  crowning  irony  comes  when  he 
casts  his  money  to  the  winds  betore  the  audience  of 
penitents.  Instead  of  spurning  it,  they  make  a  dash 
for  the  precious  paper.  And  the  girl  who  has  led 
him  to  the  sinner's  bench  betrays  him  to  the  police 
for  the  sake  of  the  reward  offered  for  his  apprehen- 
sion. Suicide  is  his  one  recourse,  and  shortly  after 
the  shot,  all  the  electric  globes  explode  in  a  vast 
crash;  the  fugitive  from  justice,  the  seeker  after 
emotional  intoxication,  staggers  with  outspread  arms 
to  the  cross  upon  the  curtain.  "His  groan  rasps 
like  an  Ecce;  his  gasp  moans  like  a  Homo,"  runs  the 
rather  futile  symbolism  of  the  stage  direction.    The 


308        THE  DRAMA  OF  TRANSITION 

prosaic  officer  closes  the  play  with  the  curt  remark 
that  "Es  ist  ein  Kurtzschluss  in  der  Leitung," — in 
briefer  words  still,  "a  short  circuit." 

And  so  the  play,  too,  with  its  flash  of  light  and 
the  surrounding  darkness,  is  artistically  a  short 
circuit.  The  closing  scene  in  the  Salvation  Army 
Hall  is  a  play  in  little — excepting,  as  we  easily  may, 
the  childish  Ecce  Homo  episode  of  the  very  end, 
which,  for  that  matter,  need  not  be  heard  in  per- 
formance. The  separate  confessions  of  the  pen- 
itents, leading  up  to  the  clerk's  own  public  repent- 
ance; his  scattering  of  the  money  and  the  consequent 
scramble,  are  conceived  in  a  search  for  a  rhythmic 
plasticity  that  serves  the  author's  revelation  of 
human  nature.  It  is  the  culminating  scene  of  the 
play  and  the  most  expertly  managed.  It  is  com- 
pact; it  does  not,  like  the  opening  scenes,  wander; 
it  produces  an  emotional  effect  independent,  not  of 
the  words,  but  of  their  individual  meanings.  This 
is  the  "exaltation"  after  which  the  Expressionists 
strive  and  to  which  occasionally  they  attain.  A 
play  that  could  do  this  in  its  entirety  would  deserve 
the  word  "great,"  regardless  of  the  "ism"  that 
hatched  it. 

Largely  on  the  strength  of  an  acquaintance  with 
this  play,  some  of  our  native  reviewers  have  some- 
what carelessly  spoken  of  O'Neill's  "Expressionism" 
in  The  Emperor  Jones  and  The  Hairy  Ape.  But 
affinity  is  not  identity,  and  if  O'Neill  were  in 
search  of  "models"  for  his  free  structure  he  need 
hardly  have  gone  abroad  while  Broadway  or  its 
vicinity  harbored  the  "formless"  plays  of  Gorki, 
Molnar  and  their  kin.  There  is  never  a  moment, 
for  that  matter,  when  O'Neill's  artistic  aim   is  in 


GERMANY  309 

doubt;  he  makes  no  cult  of  personal  mysteriousness; 
more  than  Kaiser  he  seems  to  know  the  reason  for 
his  various  changes  of  form.  He  is,  like  the  German, 
a  fallible  playwright,  but  one  feels  that  he  will  elude 
the  snares  that  his  critics  have  set  for  him,  with  their 
overpraise  and  their  eagerness  to  show  that  we,  too, 
on  this  side  of  the  ocean  have  new  "isms"  and  "ists." 

Did  these  critics  of  O'Neill  know  Die  Koralle, 
surely  they  would  have  suspected  some  connection 
between  the  theme  of  The  Hairy  Ape  and  one  of  the 
episodes  in  the  German  piece.  The  coincidence  of 
facial  resemblance  seems  to  have  occupied  Kaiser's 
thoughts  at  the  time  he  wrote  the  play,  for  in  Das 
Frauenopfer,  which  preceded  it  by  a  year,  the  re- 
semblance between  husband  and  wife  played  no 
little  part  in  her  deception  of  his  captors.  Sim- 
ilarly in  Die  Koralle  the  resemblance  between  a 
philanthropic  millionaire  and  his  secretary  provides 
the  pivot  upon  which  turns  the  impossible  plot — 
in  which  we  are  asked,  for  example,  to  believe  that 
not  even  the  man's  children  can  distinguish  him 
from  his  physical  alter  ego.  The  son  in  whom  he 
centres  his  hopes  runs  off — as  a  stoker.  The  daughter 
likewise  rebels.  His  secretary  has  lived  a  peaceful 
youth  that  the  millionaire  would  enjoy  if  only  in 
retrospect.  Thereupon  the  moneyed  potentate  slays 
his  counterpart  and  pretends,  for  the  sake  of  that 
vicarious,  retrospective  enjoyment,  to  be  the  man 
whom  he  has  slain.  From  this  decisipn  not  even 
his  children — at  last  ready  to  reveal  his  true  identity 
— can  move  him. 

Of  course,  if  you  are  one  of  the  initiate,  you  will 
know  that  the  secretary  is,  in  the  first  place,  another 
aspect  of  the  millionaire.     In  slaying  the  secretary, 


310        THE  DRAMA  OF  TRANSll  ION 

then  assuming  his  identity,  the  millionaire  merely 
returns  to  that  other  aspect  of  himself.  But  this, 
as  a  drama,  is  a  metaphysical  rebus. 

The  play  exists  for  its  detail;  it  is  not  an  artistic 
entity.  Kaiser  is  fond  betimes  of  preaching  through 
the  mouths  of  his  characters.  So,  in  the  second  act, 
there  are  interesting  arguments  on  board  the  mil- 
lionaire's yacht,  which  has  set  out  in  chase  after 
the  Albatross y  upon  which  the  son  has  sailed  as 
stoker.  They  overtake  the  son,  who  has  learned 
humanity  at  the  mouths  ot  the  furnaces.  He  has 
the  nostalgia  of  the  boilers;  a  man  turned  hairy  ape, 
as  it  were,  out  of  understanding  and  sympathy  with 
the  men  below  decks,  rather  than  a  hairy  ape  frus- 
trated in  a  blind,  boastful  groping  after  place  in 
the  scheme  of  society.  "On  the  cieck,"  he  cries, 
"the  passengers  stroll  in  their  gay  clothes,  chat  and 
are  merry.  A  few  metres  below  is  hell.  There 
human  beings  burn  with  quivering  flesh  in  hot 
shafts  before  holes  that  belch  hre.  So  that  we  can 
have  a  swift,  jolly  voyage.  .  .  .  Fever  seethes 
under  the  soft  soles  of  your  white  shoes.  Every- 
thing in  half-darkness! — Rip  up  this  wall  of  lumber 
— such  a  thin  wail,  but  what  a  gruesome  partition 
it  spells! — And  look  down — all  of  you — live  through 
it,  so  that  the  words  will  stick  in  your  throat  when 
you  try  to  be  uppish  to  any  of  the  fellows  from  down 
there!"  As  in  Hasenclever's  Der  Sohi^  so  here  there 
is  a  scene  in  which  the  son  threatens  the  father  with 
a  revolver.  There  are  interesting,  but  hardly  beauti- 
ful, moments. 

More  successful,  from  the  standpoint  of  the  play- 
wright's aim,  is  Holle  IVeg  Erde^  which,  it  may  be 
mentioned  in  passing,  seems  in  its  printed  form  to 


GERMANY  311 

prefigure  what  may  be  called  the  Expressionist 
typography.  Time  and  space  are  telescoped  as  far 
as  possible.  Lead  is  not  rubber,  as  the  compositor 
will  tell  you,  and  there  are  limits  to  such  compres- 
sion. The  piece  is  printed  "solid;"  every  scene 
forms  an  unbroken  paragraph;  stage-directions  are 
done  in  italics,  while  the  only  device  that  separates 
the  speaker  from  what  is  spoken  is  the  printing  of 
the  character's  name  in  capitals.  The  spiritual 
theme  is  that  of  human  solidarity  is  good  and  evil 
— an  ancient  one,  in  all  conscience,  since  there,  but 
for  the  grace  of  God,  goes  any  one  of  us.  "Not  the 
Murderer,  But  the  Murdered  Is  Guilty,"  runs  the 
title  of  a  novel  by  the  brilliant  young  Expressionist, 
Franz  Werfel;  so  here,  not  the  robber  but  the  robbed 
seems  to  be  guilty.  The  resume  of  a  plot,  always  an 
unsatisfactory  substitute  for  the  original,  is  triply 
so  with  reference  to  these  pieces.  As  they  aim  at 
evoking  an  emotional  flux,  so  must  they  be  dis- 
cussed in  terms  of  those  emotions. 

"Wer  is  nicht  schuldig?"  asks  the  protagonist, 
Spazierer,  in  the  second  part  of  the  play.  "Who  is 
not  guilty?"  And  it  is  this  theme  that  receives 
quasi-symphonic  treatment  toward  the  end  of  the 
piece.  Spazierer,  in  need  of  funds  with  which  to 
save  an  anguishing  soul,  is  enraged  to  find  how 
easily  that  same  money  is  spent  upon  such  luxuries 
as  jewels  for  women;  he  visits  his  fury  upon  the 
jeweler,  serves  his  term,  discovers  that  prison  is 
really  a  punishment  of  society  by  the  ill-understood 
criminals,  and  comes  forth  to  convert  the  very 
society  that  was  responsible  for  his  incarceration. 
There  is  a  fine  effect  of  antiphony  in  the  prison 
yard  when,  with   Spazierer  as  a  sort  of  spiritual 


312        THE  DRAMA  OF  TRANSITION 

chorus  director,  the  two  hirge  divisions  of  the  pris- 
oners on   one  side  and   the  distant  crowd  on    the 
other  cry  out  their  confession,  which  is  at  the  same 
time  purification.    "We  are  guilty,"  chant  the  pris- 
oners,  while,   from   afar  comes   the   answer  of  the 
crowd,   "We   are  innocent!"     "We   are   innocent!" 
echo  the  prisoners,  while  the  crowd  responds,  "We 
are  guilty!"     And  soon  guilt  and  innocence  blend 
into  one  vast  human  chorus  wherein   they  are  al- 
most indistinguishable.      It  is  at  such  moments  as 
this  that   Kaiser  suggests  the  potentialities  of  the 
new  method.    The  themes  are  not  so  new  as  is  the 
attitude,  which  determines   the  new   form.     What 
is  thematically  new  about  G^j,  with  its  millionaire's 
son    who   renounces    his    fortune    (the    son    in    Die 
Koralle)  and  ventures  forth  to  combat  the  machinery 
of  capitalism?    And  what  is  new  about  the  skeptical 
attitude  of  the  very  masses  whom  he  seeks  to  benefit 
and  who  prove  themselves  as  yet  unready  for  re- 
demption?    And  just   how  "Bolshevik"   is  a  play 
with  such  a  theme  and  such  an  outcome? 

Kaiser's  relative  importance,  then,  lies  in  his  de- 
velopment of  the  "speed-technique,"  in  his  "ex- 
altation," his  blending  of  pictorial  plasticity  and 
choral  emotion — as  if  sculpture  were  made  to  live 
and  communicate  feeling.  In  Eiiropa  he  does  this 
through  an  effective  scene  in  which  Europa's  suitors 
seek  to  win  her  in  competitive  dance  against  the 
disguised  Zeus.  The  play,  as  a  whole,  is  a  satire 
against  the  aestheticism  of  Stefan  George  and  his 
followers,  much  as— mutatis  mutandis— Gilbert's 
Patience  satirizes  Wilde.  And  Kaiser's  "fleshly" 
moral  is  that  Europa  is  weary  of  her  perfect,  terpsi- 
chorean    suitors    and    would    enjoy    some    healthy 


GERMANY  313 

animality.  More  body,  less  soul,  is  her  desire. 
And  that  is  a  large  part  of  Kaiser's  own  doctrine. 
In  Der  Gerettete  Alkibiades  he  achieves  the  same 
effect  more  than  once — in  the  scene  with  the  crowd 
of  fisherwomen,  and  again  when  Phryne  tries  with- 
out success  to  enamour  Socrates;  later,  too,  in  the 
trial  scene,  where  Socrates  appears  to  answer  the 
charges  against  Alcibiades,  who  has  fled.  Once 
again  Socrates  saves  the  hero  whose  gratitude  is 
strangely  mingled  with  resentment. 

In  all  these  plays  there  inheres  a  decided  reassort- 
ing  of  dramatic  values.  If  Kaiser  is  a  "bluff,"  then 
one  wishes  for  a  "bluffer"  like  him  with  more  talent 
for  maintaining  the  dramatic  level — a  difficult  feat, 
it  may  be  added,  since  a  continued  maintenance  of 
"exaltation"  wears  out  the  very  emotions  which  are 
meant  to  be  stirred.  With  all  his  faults,  mystifica- 
tions, grotesquerie,  and  restlessness  Kaiser  may  be 
one  of  the  precursors  of  a  new  orientation  in  the 
drama.  This  need  not,  except  to  the  fanatic  in  art, 
mean  abandonment  of  the  past;  rather  it  is  an  en- 
richment of  the  future.  Why  is  it  impossible,  side 
by  side  with  the  drama  of  character,  plot,  and  con- 
tinuity, to  harbor  the  drama  of  type  fragment  and 
immediate  emotion?  It  is  not.  All  that  is  required 
is  the  dramatist  of  genius  and  the  audience  of  re- 
sponsive talent.  i\  large  order,  that,  but  it  can  be 
filled. 

OSKAR  KOKOSCHICA 

The  theory  of  the  German  Expressionists  eluci- 
dates, ostensibly,  a  desire  on  the  part  of  the  new 
dramatists  to  get  closer  to  the  hearts  of  their  audi- 
ences— to  present  emotion  as  directly  as  may  be, 


314        THE  DRAMA  OF  TRANSITION 

without  the  baffling  intervention  of  craft,  homily, 
or  convention.  Yet  their  practise,  with  scant  ex- 
ception, has  been  quite  the  opposite.  They  have 
enfolded  themselves  in  thick  esoteric  veils  and,  so 
clad,  lead  themselves  and  the  spectators  a  merry 
dance  that  leaves  one  at  the  end  about  where  one 
was  at  the  beginning.  To  be  just,  some  of  this 
difficulty  is  due  to  an  excess  of  earnestness;  to  con- 
tinue to  be  just,  some  of  it  is  seemingly  nothing 
more  than  an  attempt  to  amaze  the  uninitiated,  to 
confound  the  bourgeoisie.  It  is  precisely  as  such  an 
example  of  shell-shock  "artistry"  that  one  should 
approach  the  so-called  "Expressionist"  dramas  of 
Oskar  Kokoschka.  If  his  paintings  are  at  all  com- 
parable to  his  stage-pieces,  they  must  be,  to  say  the 
least,  interesting  psychological  documents  though 
hardly  chefs-d'oeuvre. 

Kokoschka  was  born  in  1886,  in  Austria.  The 
four  dramas  for  which  he  has  become  notorious  are 
M order y  Hoffnung  der  Fraiien  (1907),  Der  Brennende 
Dornbusch  (191 1),  Hiob  (1917),  and  Orpheus  iind 
Euridyke  (191 8).  If  any  definite  idea  is  to  be 
picked  out  of  these  swirling  sands,  I  must  confess 
ignorance  of  the  process.  When  the  Italian  young- 
sters wish  to  become  "grotesque"  they  often  get 
silly,  but  rarely  turn  incomprehensible.  Things  are 
done,  persons  come  and  go;  they  may  be  followed, 
if  only  with  amused  disapproval.  Kokoschka  is 
comprehensible  only  in  tiny  oases,  and  then  the 
sesthetic  reward  is  almost  nil.  One  may  easily 
imagine,  in  not  so  many  years  to  come,  a  laborious 
critic  coming  upon  the  finely  printed  volume  of 
Kokoschka's  Vier  Drarnen^  shaking  his  head  sadly 
and  exclaiming:  "How  cheap  must  paper  and  labor 


GERMANY  315 

have  been  in  those  gladsome  days!  The  plays  mean 
next  to  nothing,  but  what  excellent  typography, 
what  ample  margins,  what  pride  of  craftsmanship! 
The  plays  may  not  be  easy  to  understand,  but 
heaven  be  praised  that  they  are  at  least  easy  to 
read,  and  physical  comfort  compensates  for  the  in- 
tellectual dismay." 

Criticism  implies  an  open  mind,  and  it  is  unfair 
to  oneself,  let  alone  the  creative  artist,  to  be  swift 
with  condemnation  or  ridicule.  The  Expressionist 
Movement,  like  others  that  went  before,  has  com- 
mitted its  follies,  but  it  has  at  least  brought  the 
suggestion  of  a  modified  technique  based  upon  a 
modified  attitude  toward  the  world  and  life.  So 
doing,  it  has  exaggerated  with  the  ardor  of  the  new 
convert,  but  it  would  be  folly  to  condemn  it  out  of 
impatience  or  a  desire  not  to  be  bothered.  "Expres- 
sionism" is,  in  short,  a  symptom  of  a  changing 
world  and  is  as  likely  as  not  to  produce  the  genius 
who  will  transcend  its  circumscribed  tenets.  That 
is  what  geniuses  are  for.  But  such  a  spirit  of  toler- 
ance, and  such  an  eagerness  to  understand  the  mul- 
tiform strivings  of  the  artist  to  express  himself, 
need  not  deter  us  from  sweeping  aside  altogether, 
on  occasion,  the  merely  wilful  mystifier  of  a  school 
or  sect.  Such  a  playwright  is  Kokoschka,  and  his 
plays  are  to  be  read  accordingly.  For  here  is  an 
Expressionist  who  expresses  nothing. 

Take,  for  beginning,  Murderers^  the  Hope  of 
Womankind — a  name  to  conjure  with.  The  action 
occurs  in  antiquity  before  a  tower  bathed  in  the 
glare  of  torches.  The  characters  are  nameless,  as 
in  most  of  the  "Expressionist"  plays — The  Man, 
The  Woman,  Warriors,  and  Maidens.     The  play- 


316        THE  DRAMA  OF  TRANSITION 

wright  seems  to  have  attempted  a  depiction  of  the 
savagery  that  flows  beneath  our  civilized  love- 
making.  His  verse  is  free;  his  scenic  grouping  sug- 
gestive of  canvas  effects,  with  a  certain  oscillation 
of  feeling  between  the  warriors  led  by  The  Man 
and  the  maidens  led  by  The  Woman.  One  might 
venture  to  describe  the  short  piece — it  is  in  a  single 
act — as  a  species  of  esoteric  sadism.  But  even  then, 
it  needs  the  exegesis  of  a  psychoanalyst.  As  creative 
art,  it  "says"  next  to  nothing. 

The  Burning  Bush,  likewise  in  one  act,  is  a  little 
less  obscure.  In  the  manner  of  the  new  playwrights 
it  makes  prominent  use  of  shadows,  "spotlight" 
effects,  symbolic  lights  (white  while  The  Man 
speaks  and  red  for  The  Woman's  answers),  trans- 
formation scenes  and  choruses.  Its  theme,  similar 
to  that  of  the  preceding  play,  is  voiced  in  the  chorus 
of  the  second  scene: 

Wer  himmlischer  Licbe  SchlOsscl  hat, 
Dem  nie  erstirbt  die  Stund. 
Wie  siiss  wird's  ihm  erst  sein. 
Ird'sche  Liebe  ist  nur  ein'  Pcin, 
Ein  Rosendorn  am  Pfad 
Zum  Gartentor  von  Golgotha. 
Seele,  bleib  noch  nicht  da.     .     .     . 

A  mystic  theme,  then,  of  love  reconciliation  in  the 
beyond,  presented  in  mystifying  fashion. 

Hioh  is  a  step  in  advance,  if  only  because  its  anti- 
feminism  becomes  fairly  clear  in  a  clumsy  rehash  of 
Job's  woeful  tale.  Its  motto  is  "  Pein  fur  Bein " 
and  is  elaborated  in  six  lines  of  sterile  satire; 

AIs  Adam  schlief  auf  griinem  Rasen, 
Erbarmte  Gott,  die  Sonn'  im  Mittag  stand 
Und  dem  vor  Langerweil  schon  um  Schlafen  sei. 


GERMANY  317 

Weint    Adam,    in    der    Nacht    von    einem    Rippenstoss 

erwacht:  "Ei" 
Und  da  mit  Eva  sich  begattet  fand: 
"Mein  Gott,  hatt'er  mir  nur  mein  Bein  mit  Ruh  gelassen." 

Kokoschka's  Adam  would  rather  surrender  his  Eva 
and  have  his  rib  back,  and  it  is  likewise  with  Job 
and  his  wife,  Anima,  who  brings  him  to  an  unhappy- 
end.  "And  Anima,"  as  the  closing  lines  of  the  play- 
inform  us,  "who  placed  upon  Job's  shoulder  the 
burdensome  cross — is  Eva."  The  play  does  not 
limit  itself  to  human  beings;  there  are  parrots,  dogs, 
heads  poking  up  through  apertures  in  a  canvas  that 
is  painted  with  the  bodies  of  men  clad  in  mourning. 
"How  love  has  turned  my  head,"  groans  Job,  "since 
in  this  empty  house  the  gentle  voice  of  a  woman 
called  me  unto  her."  If  Kokoschka  intended  to 
suggest,  in  his  action,  the  turning  of  Job's  head,  he 
has  at  least  met  with  outward  success — and  com- 
municated that  turning  to  the  reader  as  well. 
"Essig  gab  und  Wein  dafur  wollte,"  says  Anima  in 
one  place.  And  that  is  what  the  author  has  done 
with  us:  given  us  vinegar  and  asked  wine  for  it. 
This  is  a  mere  toying  with  theatrical  mechanism,  a 
rather  faded  novelty  that  irritates,  because  it  serves 
no  significant  purpose.  So,  too,  the  Italians  have 
played  with  marionettes  upon  the  stage,  with  alter- 
nating lights  (though  not  yet  with  severed  heads) 
and  have  run  into  the  same  alleys  of  fatuity.  It  is 
not  at  present  easy  to  explain  the  Expressionist 
predilection  for  severed  heads — a  fondness  derived, 
perhaps,  from  Wedekind's  Fruhl'mgs  Erwachen. 

As  for  Kokoschka's  Orpheus  and  Eurydice^  no 
purpose  would  be  served  by  expatiating  upon  it. 
If  stage  directions  made  a  play,  perhaps  this  impo- 


318        THE  DRAMA  OF  TRANSITIOx\ 

sition  in  three  acts  and  an  epilogue  would  achieve 
comprehensibility.  As  it  is,  some  things  pass  under- 
standing; others  do  not  reach  its  threshold.  This 
play  barely  steps  across.  Kokoschka's  "advanced" 
strivings,  if  they  are  sincere,  have  moved  in  a  circle 
that  brings  him  back  somewhere  behind  the  point 
from  which  he  set  out.  He  is  not  to  be  thought  of 
in  the  same  connection  as  Hasenclever,  who  is  a 
serious,  if  sometimes  indistinct,  artist;  or  Fritz  von 
Unruh,  in  whose  work  an  ethical  aim  inheres;  or 
Georg  Kaiser.  Kaiser  is  no  genius,  nor,  for  that 
matter,  has  the  "Expressionist"  group  thus  far  pro- 
duced any  personage  approaching  Hauptmann's 
stature.  But  Kaiser  does  "express"  something  in  a 
personal,  recognizable  medium.  Kokoschka  reduces 
the  theory  to  absurdity.  Somewhere,  I  believe, 
there  was  report  that  one  of  his  plays  had  caused  a 
riot.  Perhaps  this  is  not  quite  the  sort  of  participa- 
tion aimed  at  by  the  "Expressionists"  in  their 
fusion  of  audience  with  stage,  but  in  the  case  of 
Kokoschka  it  is  the  one  kind  that  may  be  under- 
stood at  this  distance.  The  most  appropriate  simile 
one  may  suggest  for  his  plays  is  that  flickering 
phantasmagoria  which  parades  under  one's  lashes 
just  before  the  sufferer  sinks  into  a  fevered  slumber. 


OTHER  DR.AiMATISTS 

STERNHEIM,  KORNFELD.  VOX  UNRLH.  WERFEL, 
GOERING.  TOLLER 

The  fairly  detailed  consideration  of  Hasenclever, 
Kaiser,  and  Kokoschka  has  given,  I  hope,  a  notion 
of  the  newer  dramatists'  practice,  both  near  the 
heights  and  toward  the  depths.    The  first  two,  how- 


GERMANY  319 

ever,  are  no  more  necessarily  the  best  of  the  dram- 
atists than  Kokoschka  is  necessarily  the  worst. 
Carl  Sternheim,  for  example,  would  make  quite  as 
interesting  a  subject  as  Georg  Kaiser;  both  stand 
out  from  their  confreres  for  a  certain  aloofness  from 
their  material,  for  a  certain  restlessness  that  is  re- 
flected in  their  numerous  and  varied  plays.  Stern- 
heim, in  Diebold's  phraseology,  is  the  ironic  "grand- 
seigneur"  whose  skepticism  destroys  the  will  to  the 
ideal;  he  is  precicux;  he  employs,  chiefly,  anti- 
lyrical  puppets  whose  significance  is  made  clear  not 
so  much  from  what  they  say  as  from  what  occurs 
in  the  tale  itself.  He  is  chiefly  Geist,  with  little 
Seek — the  cynical  anti-Philistine.  Paul  Kornfeld, 
on  the  other  hand,  derives  from  the  Storm  and 
Stress,  and  is  as  soulful  (in  Diebold's  sense)  as 
Sternheim  is  intellectual.  His  Die  Verfuhrung  has 
been  called,  indeed,  "an  inexhaustible,  ever-repeated 
eruption  of  a  volcano  of  suffering."  His  personage, 
Bitterlich,  has  become  one  of  the  salient  types  of 
the  new. drama:  he  is  the  love-seeker  who,  unable 
to  recognize  love  when  it  comes  to  him,  is  damned. 
For  love  must  bring  sacrifice,  not  pride.  Himmel 
und  H'dlle  shows  the  reverse  of  the  coin;  instead  of 
a  proud,  blasphemous  Bitterlich,  a  humble,  dutiful 
Jacob,  spokesman  of  mankind. 

Fritz  von  Unruh,  who,  in  Offiziere  and  Louis 
Ferdinand^  Prinz  von  Preussen,  wrote  two  plays  of 
high  merit,  though  they  are  not  definitely  in  the 
Expressionist  category,  rose  to  new  renown  through 
the  unfinished  trilogy  that  comprises,  thus  far, 
Ein  Geschlecht  and  Platz.  The  motto  of  his  Louis 
Ferdinand  afl^ords  an  insight  into  his  ideology: 
"Wie  ueber  Sterne  das  Gesetz,  erhebt  sich  ueber 


320        THE  DRAMA  OF  TRANSITION 

Menschen  das  Pflicht,  gross  unci  ernst."  "As  law 
above  the  stars,  so  reigns  Duty  above  mankind, 
vast  and  solemn."  It  is  the  direction  of  that  duty 
and  its  ancient  conflict  with  desire  which  engross 
the  impassioned  mind  of  von  Unruh. 

Such  is  the  conflict  in  Offiziere,  Naturalistic  in 
facture,  though  with  forecasts  of  the  writer's  later 
Expressionism.  Such  is  the  conflict  of  Louis  Ferdi- 
nand. Such,  with  a  change  of  direction,  is  the  con- 
flict of  the  trilogy.  That  Duty  exists  is,  to  von 
Unruh,  a  cosmic  axiom;  it  must  shift  from  the 
service  of  Might  to  that  of  Right.  Ein  Geschlecht 
raises  the  figure  of  the  suffering  mother  (the  Mater 
Dolorosa  theme  of  the  Expressionists)  to  that  of  a 
powerful,  eternal  symbol — Mother  Earth  herself, 
forever  bearing  that  her  offspring  may  forever  re- 
turn to  her  bosom.  This  is  not  only  protest  against 
the  madness  of  warfare  but  an  image  of  life's  own 
cruelty. 

The  most  considerable  production  of  Franz  VVerfel 
in  the  drama — for  he  is  an  able  poet  and  novelist 
as  well — is,  thus  far,  the  panoramic,  phantasmagoric 
Spiegelmeijschy  denominated  by  its  author  a  Magic 
Trilogy.  Spiegelmensch  himself  (i.  e.,  mirror-man) 
is  one  of  the  numerous  alter-egos  of  Expressionist 
drama,  one  of  the  many  children  of  Goethe's  Mephis- 
topheles.  He  is  the  counter-protagonist  of  what 
may  well  be  called  a  twentieth-century  morality, 
only  that  this  morality  is  replete  with  high  moments, 
though  more  efi^ective  in  episodes  than  as  a  whole. 
An  alter-ego-drama,  then,  redeemed  from  unorig- 
inality  by  its  poetry,  its  strange  conceptions,  its 
instinctive  artistry,  its  efi^ective  portrayal  of  our 
many  conflicting,  deceptive  selves  forever  in  a  new 


GERMANY  321 

disguise  assumed  by  Spiegelmensch.  Its  renun- 
ciatory moral  would  seem  to  be  a  sort  of  Nirvanitas 
nirvanitatum;  one  feels  uneasy  amidst  the  hectic 
self-dissolution  of  these  young  spirits. 

One  must  nevertheless  recognize  that  far  from 
shirking  the  discipline  of  an  ordered  life,  not  a  few 
of  the  Expressionists  are  Puritanically  severe  in 
their  very  Un-Puritanism.  Our  own  Mr.  Arthur 
Davison  Ficke,  in  his  Mr.  Faust^  has  written  some 
lines  that  might  serve  to  characterize  the  new 
strivings  of  such  of  the  Expressionists  as  Werfel; 
they  are  all  the  more  significant  in  that  the  Devil, 
in  Ficke's  play,  tempts  Faust,  not  with  woman  or 
wealth,  but  with  that  selfsame  paradise  of  spiritual 
peace  which  Werfel's  Thamal  has  sought  through 
all  the  trickeries  of  his  alter-ego  Spiegelmensch: 

.     I  will  create, — 
I  and  the  souls  that  after  me  shall  come — 
By  passion  of  desire  a  pillar  of  flame 
Above  the  wastes  of  life.     If  no  God  be, 
I  will  from  my  deep  soul  create  a  God 
Into  the  universe  to  fight  for  me. 

How  the  false  gods  arrive  with  the  hocus-pocus  of 
their  "religions"  receives  dramatic  commentary  not 
only  in  Spiegelmensch,  but  in  Werfel's  newest  piece, 
Bocksgesang.  Only  one  wonders,  contrasting  the 
mirror-like  clearness  of  the  first  with  the  hazy 
action  of  the  second,  whether  Werfel  has  not  been 
indulging  in  a  little  bit  of  dramaturgic  hocus-pocus 
himself. 

Questioning  of  God,  Fate  and  man  is  not  confined 
to  the  modern  morality  type;  it  occurs  even  in  the 

•Cincinnati    1922. 
21 


322        THE  DRAMA  OF  TRANSITION 

so-called  revolutionary  Expressionist  plays,  of  which 
Reinhard  Goering's  Seeschlacht  is  a  noteworthy  pro- 
totype. I  do  not  think  that  the  charge  of  being  a 
mere  propaganda  play  may  justly  be  brought  against 
Seeschlacht  any  more  than  against  Toller's  Masse- 
Mensch.  There  is  no  conspicuous  distortion  of 
events  or  character  to  a  foreordained  end.  Goering's 
tragedy  is  in  a  single  long  act,  more  lyrical  than 
dramatic,  yet  undoubtedly  effective,  depicting  the 
nascent  revolt  that  brews  in  the  armored  turret  of 
a  battleship.  But  does  it  take  much  discernment 
to  see  that  this  is  no  mere  battleship,  for  all  the  in- 
spiration of  the  piece  in  a  war-time  mutiny?  "I 
know,"  says  the  Fifth  Sailor,  the  guiding  inspira- 
tion of  the  piece.  "What  we  are  doing  is  madness 
and  crime  ...  for  there  are  things  between 
one  human  being  and  another  which  it  is  a  more 
sacred  duty  to  fulfil  than  any  other  battle," 

Again  a  conflict  of  duties  between  man  as  State 
and  man  as  Mankind.  It  is  a  similar  conflict,  with 
the  distinctions  more  finely  marked  and  more  clearly 
presented,  that  is  dramatized  in  Ernst  Toller's 
notable  piece  Masse-Mensch.  The  very  title  em- 
phasizes the  important  theme  of  the  play,  for  Masse 
stands  for  man  in  the  mass,  while  Mensch  is  man 
the  individual,  the  human  being,  the  freely  de- 
veloped personality.  A  revolutionary  play,  indeed, 
but  directed  against  the  very  revolutionists  them- 
selves. And  written  in  that  same  prison  wherein 
Toller  composed  his  latest  drama.  Die  Maschinen- 
stilrmer.  Toller  was  Minister  of  Justice  in  the 
Comrnunistic  government  that  lived  for  a  short 
while  in  Bavaria,  and  is  now — at  the  age  of  twenty- 
six— serving  a  twenty-year  sentence.    His  first  play, 


GERMANY  323 

Die  Wandlung^  is  an  ego-drama,  turning  upon  the 
experiences  of  the  sculptor-hero,  Friedrich,  who  en- 
lists as  an  escape  from  ennui;  at  the  end  of  the  hair- 
raising  spectacle,  with  its  pandemonium  of  the  liv- 
ing and  the  dead,  the  sculptor  smashes  the  statue 
upon  which  he  has  been  working, — a  statue  ded- 
icated to  the  glory  of  his  nation.  Symbolism  could 
be  no  plainer.  Masse-Menschy  however,  is  of  far 
better  stuff.  It  is  no  mere  propaganda  of  the 
proletariat  against  the  patrician.  Indeed,  in  his 
foreword  to  the  second  edition^  he  states  expressly 
that  he  does  not  believe  in  a  proletarian  art  except 
in  so  far  as  that  art  merges  into  the  universally 
human.  And  what  is  the  purport  of  the  play  itself 
but  to  free  the  mass  from  the  raw,  brutal  force  of 
its  own  numbers  and  point  the  way  to  individual 
creativeness.^  Moloch  is  Moloch,  whether  it  be  the 
conservative  State  that  slays  or  the  revolutionary 
Mass.  Murder  is  murder;  war  is  war.  The  Christ- 
like woman  protagonist,  Sonja  Irene  L.  (the  only 
person  in  the  play  who  is  named)  goes  to  her  death 
at  the  hands  of  those  for  whom  she  has  lived,  be- 
cause her  message  is  sounded  too  soon.  She  is  not 
understood  by  the  very  men  and  women  who  have 
called  upon  her  leadership  and  rejected  its  far 
vision. 

There  is  art  in  this  proclamation,  as  there  is  hu- 
manity. Toller  makes  highly  effective  use  of  the 
dream-technique  (three  of  the  seven  scenes  are 
presented  as  visions);  he  employs  with  skill  choric 
effects  and  plastic,  sculptural  groupings  of  crowds. 
There  is  color,  rhythm  of  motion,  antiphony.    There 

■  Potsdam,  1922.  "Es  gibt  eine  oroletarische  Kunst  nur  insofern,  als  fiir  den 
Gestaltenden  die  Mannigfaltigkeiten  proletarischen  Seeleolebens  Wege  zur  For- 
mung  des  Ewig-Menschlichen  sind." 


324       THE  DRAMA  OF  TRANSITION 

is  an  emotional  surge  that  companions  the  progress 
of  feeling  in  his  character  symbols.  This  is  not 
allegory  that  evades  expression;  it  is  expression 
highly  concentrated  into  symbolic  figures  who  do 
not  lose  their  human  significance.  In  coherency, 
plasticity,  management  of  the  speed-technique,  the 
play  betters  Kaiser's  /'o;;  Morgetis  bis  M'ttternachts. 
It  is  one  of  the  outstanding  products  of  the  new 
dramaturgy. 

Die  Maschinenstiirmer  relates,  ostensibly,  a  tale  of 
wretchedness  among  the  F.nglish  weavers  in  1815, 
when  machinery  began  to  displace  hand  labor  at 
the  looms.  Here,  too,  is  a  leader  slain;  here,  too, 
machinery  wrecked.  And  here,  too,  the  new  order 
brings  misery,  as  did  the  old.  By  these  tokens  Toller 
means  not  only  England  and  not  only  18 15,  Yet, 
though  he  dedicate  his  plays  {Masse-Mensch,  for 
example)  to  the  Proletariat,  and  write  with  con- 
scious contemporaneity,  he  has  done  some  work 
that  will  in  all  likelihood  outlast  the  ferment  of 
to-day. 

To  these  names,  to  these  plays,  a  goodly  number 
might  be  added,  for  the  dramatic  fervor  runs  high 
in  contemporary  Germany.  Out  of  the  welter  rises 
the  one  great  contribution  of  the  new  dramatists: 
a  new  soul,  a  new  intellect  for  a  new  world. 

It  is  not  necessary  to  "judge"  the  Expressionists 
at  this  date;  they  may  disappear  with  the  course  of 
time,  leaving  only  whatever  vital  elements  of  their 
theory  prove  available  to  the  purposes  of  the  ones 
that  follow.  That  they  have  brought  a  nouieau 
frisson  to  the  drama  is  undeniable;  thus  far  they 
seem    to    have    affected    the    paraphernalia   of   the 


GERMANY  325 

stage  rather  than  the  inner  life  of  the  drama.  They 
are,  then,  experimenters.  In  so  far  as  they  are 
frankly  propagandistic,  they  must  share  the  obloquy 
of  all  such  special  pleaders  in  the  arts,  however 
much  one  may  sympathize  with  their  noble  out- 
look. Claiming  recognition  as  social  forces,  they 
often  defeat  even  this  purpose  with  a  highly  individ- 
ualized practice;  their  avowed  universality  becomes 
the  property  of  a  small,  initiated  clique;  ostensibly  di- 
recting their  efforts  toward  international  mankind, 
they  frequently  display  a  disconcerting  esoterism,  far 
more  difficult  of  access  than  any  ivory  tower.  These 
artists,  Hke  all  others,  whatever  their  professions, 
do  not  exist  for  the  mass;  the  masses  exist  for  them. 
Yet,  despite  these  tendencies  toward  a  dehumaniza- 
tion  of  the  stage,  toward  geometric  stylization  of 
life,  they  have  achieved  moments  of  beauty  that 
may,  in  the  hands  of  the  not  impossible  genius,  be 
lengthened  into  hours.  They  have  brought  a  color- 
ful sweep,  a  massive  plasticity,  a  musicality  of 
method  that  address  a  need  of  the  soul;  they  have 
assembled  the  elements  of  a  new  art,  if  not  the 
finished  product. 


THE  YIDDISH  DRAMA 


THE  YIDDISH   DRAMA 

A  HISTORICAL  AND  CRITICAL  SURVEY 

One  of  the  chief  effects  of  the  war  upon  the  lesser 
peoples  has  been  the  rekindling  of  the  Jewish  na- 
tional spirit.  This  phenomenon  is  always  closely- 
related  to  the  Yiddish  language,  which,  in  the 
course  of  its  precarious  existence  has  on  numerous 
occasions  been  given  premature  burial  by  the  learned 
and  the  pessimistic,  only  to  rise,  like  the  Phoenix, 
new-born  from  its  own  ashes.  The  war  has  helped, 
moreover,  to  shift  modern  Israel's  literary  center  of 
gravity  from  Warsaw  of  the  old  world  to  New  York, 
the  metropolis  of  the  new. 

Pessimism  with  regard  to  the  Yiddish  tongue 
naturally  extends  itself  to  the  institutions  using  that 
tongue,  so  that  prophecies  of  imminent  dissolution 
of  the  Yiddish  theatre  have  been  rife  during  the 
past  twenty-five  years.  Yet,  though  such  pes- 
simism is  well-founded,  the  Jewish  theatre  persists 
in  flouting  the  prophets,  and  where  some  see  the 
embers  of  a  dying  fire,  others,  even  to-day,  behold 
the  first  rays  of  a  new  dawn. 

However  that  may  be,  there  are  distinct  signs 
that  the  Yiddish  spirit,  craving  self-expression  and 
foreseeing  to-morrow's  possibilities,  will  in  this 
country  adopt  the  national  language  when  neces- 
sary, even  as  have  the  Irish  dramatists,  whose  first 
efforts  were  written  in  Gaelic.  Long  ago  the  Jewish 
publications   found   it   necessary   and   profitable   to 

329 


330        THE  DRAMA  OF  TR^^XSITION 

issue  English  supplements;  more  recently  poets  like 
Rosenfeld  and  Yehoash  have  written  in  their  adopted 
tongue  as  well  as  in  their  vernacular.  To-day  trans- 
lations of  Yiddish  plays  are  being  presented  in 
English,  not  only  to  Gentiles,  but  also  to  Amer- 
icanized Jews.  The  step  from  translation  to  original 
productions  in  English  is  a  short  one.  There  is 
thus  a  conservation  of  energy  in  art  as  well  as  in 
science;  though  the  great  languages,  like  the  great 
nations,  absorb  the  smaller,  yet  the  spirit  of  the 
latter  persists  through  the  transformation. 

Yiddish,  variously  termed  Jewish,  Jargon,  and 
Judeo-German,  is  closely  related  to  High  German, 
and  in  its  dialectic  variations,  which  are  not  few, 
follows  the  High  German  dialects  of  the  Middle 
Rhine,  with  Frankfort  for  its  centre.'  The  infusion 
of  Hebrew  words,  outside  the  purely  ritualistic 
terms,  probably  occurred  during  the  sixteenth  cen- 
tury; at  this  time  also,  Slavic  elements  were  added, 
due  to  the  intercourse  between  the  Jews  in  Bohemia, 
Poland,  and  Lithuania  with  those  they  had  left 
behind  in  Germany.  Thus,  despite  the  mixed 
character  of  the  Yiddish  vocabulary,  which  is  further 
altered  by  the  language  of  the  immediate  environ- 
ment, its  speech  remains  fundamentally  a  German 
dialect. 

Curiously  enough,  as  shall  soon  be  noted  in  con- 
nection with  the  earliest  Yiddish  plays,  the  Yiddish 
tongue  received  strongest  opposition  from  the  Jews 

'  During  the  hysterical  period  of  accusations  that  added  grim  humor  to  the 
late  war,  an  Englishman  made  the  staiUing  discok'ery  that  though  the  letters  of 
Yiddish  are  Hebrew  characters,  the  lansuape  is  fundamentally  German  in  struc- 
ture. This  he  proceeded  to  publi?h  as  i/  the  Hebrew  characters  were  a  specie?  of 
camouflage!  One  woadeia  whether  he  ever  discovered  the  vast  Teutoaic  element 
in  English. 


THE  YIDDISH  DRAMA  331 

themselves,^  even  as  among  the  French  Canadians 
to-day  the  use  of  French  is  by  some  considered  to  be 
a  prejudicial  influence,  while  among  the  "West 
Britons"  Irish  is  considered  too  primitive. 

It  is  but  one  of  the  many  ironies  in  the  history  of 
the  Hebrews  that  a  race  whose  tragedy  has  occupied 
the  world-stage  for  more  than  a  half  century  of 
centuries  should  have  established  its  national  theatre 
only  within  the  past  fifty  years;  yet  since  the  year 
1876,  which  witnessed  the  founding  of  the  Yiddish 
stage,  Jewish  drama  has  passed  through  several 
distinct  phases.  That  one  of  the  oldest  of  peoples 
should  possess  the  youngest  of  stages  is  not  so  par- 
adoxical as  at  first  appears.  Religious  opposition  to 
the  theatre  is  not  an  attitude  confined  to  the  pious 
Jew,  nor  are  conditions  which  favor  the  stage  apt 
to  arise  among  a  people  whose  fate  it  has  been  to 
wander  over  the  length  and  breadth  of  the  earth. 
In  the  arena  of  the  ages  this  nomad  nation  has  been 
too  intensely  occupied  in  living  its  drama  to  have 
had  the  opportunity  to  simulate  it  in  the  theatre. 

The  early  Hebrews  founded  no  stage.  Some  in- 
vestigators have  discovered  in  certain  well-known 
parts  of  the  Bible  examples  of  incipient  dramatic 
form,  such  as  the  Song  of  Songs  and  the  Book  of 
Job,  but  later  critics  have  dismissed  the  evidence. 
It  is  the  festival  of  Purim  (Feast  of  Esther)  that  is 
of  practically  sole  importance  in  connection  with 
the  origin  of  Jewish  drama. 

The  Talmud  makes  mention^  of  representations, 

'  The  Yiddish  poet  Yehoash  tells  of  an  amusing  episode  in  Palestine,  where 
a  band  of  Jewish  students,  in  their  fervent  advocacy  of  Hebrew  as  a  national 
tongue,  refused  to  listen  to  a  lecture  and  a  play  in  Yiddish.  And  this  only  yes- 
terday. 

•Megillah,  7,  II;  Sanhedrin,  7,  II.  See  M.  Pines,  Histoire  de  la  Litlirature 
Judio-AUemande,  page  494. 


332        THE  DRAMA  OK  TI^ANSITION 

not  of  a  very  high  order,  it  is  true,  held  at  Piirim. 
These  were  more  or  less  imbued  with  the  dramatic 
spirit  and  contained  the  germs  that  were  to  develop 
into  pieces  comparable  to  the  mysteries  whence  the 
modern  European  theatre  evolved.  It  became  cus- 
tomary for  Haman,  who  stood  as  symbol  of  the 
foes  of  Israel,  to  be  burned  in  effigy  "on  a  small 
pyre,  over  which  the  participants  jumped  a  number 
of  times  in  gleeful  rejoicing  over  the  downfall  of 
their  worst  enemies."  Spontaneous  merrymaking 
would  naturally  arise  under  such  circumstances  and 
the  better  jests  would  be  transmitted  from  year  to 
year  until  the  ceremony  took  on  a  more  ordered 
form.  This  phase,  approaching  the  dramatic  in  its 
formal  dialogue,  was  reached  in  fifth-century  Italy. 
But  such  approaches  to  dramatic  representations 
were  sporadic. 

The  first  real  Jewish  contribution  to  the  drama  is 
a  dramatization  of  the  story  of  Esther,  which  dates 
from  the  ninth  or  the  tenth  centiu-y;  lour  hundred 
years  later  we  find  records  of  Jews  participating  in 
similar  protluctions  having  for  their  subject  the 
story  of  Haman's  punishment.  Here  the  chief 
element  of  fun  was  the  dressing  of  men  in  women's 
garb  (an  act  forbidden  by  the  Bible)  and  general 
hilarity.  Were  it  not  for  the  greater  freedom  per- 
mitted from  the  earliest  times  on  this  holiday, 
religious  prejudice  would  have  perhaps  forever 
stifled  the  chance  for  the  development  of  a  Jewish 
stage. 

These  same   Purim   plays    iPurim-spicle)    furnish 

the  subject  for  the  earliest  Yiddish  pieces,  the  high 

mark  in  the  popularity  of  which  was  reached  in  the 

^    eighteenth  century.    The  first  printed  text,  entitled 


THE  YIDDISH  DRAMA  333 

Ahasuerus  play  and  anonymous,  was  published  at 
Frankfort  in  1708;  before  171 1  another  Purim-spiel 
appeared,  in  the  form  of  the  German  farcical  clown- 
dialogues,  based  upon  the  story  of  the  sale  of  Jo- 
seph, and  written  by  Hermann  of  Limburg.  This 
was  perhaps  the  first  Yiddish  "hit,"  for  when  it 
was  produced  two  years  later,  at  Frankfort,  with  its 
scenic  accessories,  costumes,  and  stage  effects,  so 
great  was  the  excitement  among  the  denizens  of  the 
ghetto  that  two  soldiers  were  detailed  to  manage 
the  crowd.  The  play  was  acted  by  Jewish  students 
from  Prague  and  Hamburg,  and  practically  the 
same  company  later  produced  the  play  at  Metz. 
The  low  comedy  part  devolved  upon  a  character 
named  Pickelherring, — not  a  creation  of  the  author, 
but  rather  a  stock  merry-andrew  in  earlier  and  con- 
temporary pieces.^ 

To  the  foregoing  plays  may  be  added  The  Sacri- 
fice of  Isaac  and  David  and  Goliath.  These  pieces, 
of  small  literary  value,  indicate  German  influence. 
Many  of  the  details  are  coarse,  resembling  the 
comedies  and  burlesques  then  in  vogue  among  the 
Gentiles.  Like  those  of  the  earlier  continental 
mysteries,  their  subjects  are  taken  from  the  Bible, 
and  the  comic  element  introduces  a  secular  note. 
The  acting  of  them,  too,  was  in  mediaeval  fashion, 
as  may  be  gathered  from  texts,  where  the  characters, 
upon  entering,  first  address  the  audience.  The 
actors  of  the  first  Jewish  pieces  were  student  am- 
ateurs. As  may  be  expected,  the  success  of  the 
Biblical  plays  bred  a  host  of  imitations,  some  of  the 
latter   rivaling   the   originals   in   popularity.     Most 

'The  popular  mind  names  its  merry  andrews  often  after  dishes.  Pickelherring 
is  the  Dutch  analoeue  for  Jean  Potage  in  France,  Hans  Wurst  in  Germany,  Jack 
Pudding  in  England,  and  Sigaor  Maccaroni  in  Italy. 


^ 


334        THE  DRAMA  OF  TRANSITION 

liked  of  all,  perhaps,  is  the  tale  of  Joseph,  which,  in 
Eliakum  Zunser's  modern  dramatic  version  repre- 
sents the  best  Yiddish  work  on  the  subject.' 

While  these  early  pieces  possess  a  certain  interest 
as  Jewish  dramatic  products,  they  did  little  or  noth- 
ing toward  founding  a  national  theatre.- 

I 

In  the  early  nineteenth  century,  long  before  the 
definite  establishment  ot  the  Yiddish  stage,  there 
had  arisen  a  Jewish  literature  in  dramatic  form 
which,  aside  from  purely  dramatic  considerations, 
presents  a  worthy  and  authentic  picture  of  the 
time  from  the  standpoint  of  Jewish  social  and  po- 
litical life.  The  plays  thus  written  were  not  intended 
for  presentation,  but  were  the  offspring  of  that 
movement  for  reform  and  enlightenment  known  in 
Jewish  history  as  the  Ilaskala.  Originating  with  the 
,,  German  philosopher,  Mendelssohn,  prototype  of  Lcs- 
r-lsing's  Nathan  der  U'eise^  the  Haskala  propaganiia, 
among  other  things,  directed  its  forces  against 
Judeo-German,  upon  which  it  foisted  the  appellation 
Jargon.  It  sought  also  to  promote  the  study  of  the 
Bible  in  a  rational  spirit  and  to  combat  the  fanat- 
icism of  the  Khassid  sect. 

For  the  jargon  the  Haskalites  would  substitute 
German,  although  under  the  rule  of  Alexander  II 
in  Russia  the  Russian  tongue  loomed  large  as  a 
possible  linguistic  substitute.    The  onslaught  against 

■■<Y  '  Sec  Leo  Wiener:  .1   History  of  Yiddish  Literature  in  the  Sinetefnth  Century, 

P    page  231  seq. 

'  Those  who  read  Yiddish  will  find  a  \vealth  of  valuable  material  in  B.  Gorin's 
Die  Ceschichte  von  Yiddishen  Theater,  2  vols..  New  York,  1918.  He  refers  to  a 
number  of  Jewish  playwrights  in  Spain,  PortuRal,  Italy,  but  since  they  used  the 
language  of  these  respective  countries  and  dealt  with  contemporary  themes  they 
do  not  properly  belong  in  a  history  of  the  Jewish  drama.  Another  work  worth 
consulting  is  M.  Seifiert:  DieCeschichU  von  Yiddishen  Theater,  in  Drei  Zeit-Perioden, 
New  York,  1897. 


THE  YIDDISH  DRAMA  335 

the  humble  language  of  the  people,  however,  was 
of  no  avail,  and  Yiddish  came  out  victorious  through 
an  epoch  of  intense  hatred  and  factional  strife.  As 
late  as  1862  a  petition  was  presented  by  Jews  to 
the  Russian  government,  asking  for  the  prohibition 
of  publications  in  Yiddish,  with  the  exception  of 
religious  works.  And,  as  another  irony  in  the  his- 
tory of  the  race,  a  Russian  refusal  taught  the  Jews 
toleration  toward  themselves. 

The  Khassid  sect — that  other  target  of  the  Has- 
kalites'  aim — lived  in  enthusiastic,  whole-souled 
worship.  They  obeyed  not  only  the  spirit  which 
giveth  Hfe,  but  also  the  letter  that  killeth.  The 
Khassidim  were  fanatics  who  expressed  their  ex- 
treme ideas  even  in  their  manner  of  dress  and  per- 
sonal grooming.  Their  queer  caps  and  long  coats 
with  the  inevitable  girdle,  their  locks  of  hair  coming 
down  over  the  temples,  their  sacred  beards,  have 
long  formed  a  stock  topic  for  satire  in  Yiddish 
literature.  The  Khassidim  believed  their  favorite 
rabbis  to  be  quite  as  omnipotent  as  the  Lord  him- 
self; such  a  rabbi,  for  instance,  could  send  children 
to  barren  wives,  forecast  the  future,  save  hopeless 
invalids,  and  what  not  else.  Much  of  this  fraud- 
ulent practice  was  forced  upon  the  rabbi  by  the 
sheer  ignorance  and  superstition  of  an  uncultured, 
barely  civilized  community,  which  demanded  mir- 
acles, and  the  demand  was  met  with  the  facility  and 
ambiguity  of  the  oracle  at  Delphi. 

It  is  this  Khassid  element  that  furnishes  the 
humorous  content  of  the  dramatic  literature  in- 
spired by  the  Haskala  and  the  social-political  con- 
ditions of  the  Jews  at  the  time  which  we  are  con- 
sidering.    Thus  in   Gottlober's   The  Marriage  Veil 


336        THE  DRAMA  OF  TRANSITION 

(1838),  Yossele  is  a  hero  impregnated  with  the  new 
thought  of  his  day,  and  loves  Freudele.  But  the 
course  of  their  love  is  too  true  to  the  proverb,  and 
far  from  marrying  each  other  they  are  to  meet,  on 
the  same  day,  a  most  dreadful  fate.  Yossele  is  to 
wed  a  one-eyed  Yiddish  Katisha^  while  Freudele  is 
to  be  united  for  life  to  a  fool.  Yossele,  however, 
knows  the  people  with  whom  he  is  dealing,  and 
realizes  that  he  can  play  upon  their  superstitions; 
which  he  does  so  well  that  when  the  marriages  take 
place  it  is  he  who  is  united  to  Freudele  under  the 
marriage  veil,  while  with  justice  more  poetic  than 
probable  the  one-eyed  Gorgon  is  married  to  the 
dolt. 

Fools,  it  may  be  noticed  in  passing,  have  acquired 
a  popularity  upon  the  Yiddish  stage  quite  parallel 
to  their  vogue  in  Elizabethan  drama. 

One  of  the  best  Yiddish  comedies,  Ludwig  Lev- 
insohn's  The  IVomens  Knots  (i.  e.,  kerchief  knots, 
where  money  is  hoarded),  directs  its  humor  sim- 
ilarly against  the  Khassidim.  Through  an  inventive 
lie  told  by  one  of  the  sect  to  his  wife,  the  news  is 
spread  all  over  town  that  monogamic  restrictions 
among  the  Jews  are  to  be  abolished.  This  is  to  be 
done  so  as  to  enable  the  Jews  to  raise  enough  money, 
by  the  multiple  dowries  coming  with  several  wives, 
to  pay  off  the  town's  taxes.  Rather  than  face  such 
a  calamity  the  moral  wives  get  together  every  coin 
that  they  have  stored  away  in  old  stockings  and 
knotted  kerchiefs  and  bring  the  tax-paying  fund  of 
virtue  to  the  assembly  of  Khassidim,  which  promptly 
proceeds  to  spend  it  on  a  junket. 

The  type  of  the  termagant  has  acquired  a  con- 
stant, if  not  creditable  popularity  upon  the  Yiddish 


THE  YIDDISH  DRAMA  337 

stage.  In  the  comedy,  Serkele,  by  Solomon  Ettinger 
(not  published  until  1861,  some  six  years  after  the 
author's  death),  we  find  the  prototype  of  a  long  line 
of  Jewish  Xantippes  whose  collected  oaths  and  im- 
precations represent  a  most  formidable  arsenal  of 
depreciatory  volubility.  Here  again  we  find  a  sim- 
ilarity in  the  Elizabethan  audience  and  the  Jewish. 
Go  no  further  than  King  Lear's  curses  upon  his 
daughters  and  you  will  find  a  wealth  of  condemna- 
tion comparable  in  vehemence  to  the  Yiddish,  with 
a  rich  resonance  that  falls  (independent  of  its  con- 
tent) with  pleasing  familiarity  upon  Jewish  ears. 
Domestic  quarrels  particularly,  and  the  choice  oaths 
they  engender,  have  from  the  beginning  been  one 
of  the  mainstays  of  the  Yiddish  stage,  and  it  is  as 
well  to  remember  that  these  oaths,  if  literally  trans- 
lated, convey  to  the  Gentile  reader  a  distinctly 
wrong  impression  as  regards  both  the  morality  and 
the  wholesomeness  of  common  Jewish  life. 

Ettinger  was  thoroughly  conversant  with  German 
literature,  a  knowledge  of  which  reveals  itself  in  all 
he  has  written;  Serkele  is  constructed  upon  the 
model  of  Lessing's  dramas.  The  sordid  machina- 
tions of  the  virago,  Serkele,  to  deprive  her  niece  of 
costly  jewels  and  to  marry  oflF  her  silly  daughter  to 
advantage,  lead  us  through  a  melodramatic  plot, 
with  Serkele  exposed  as  thief,  liar,  and  diabolical 
plotter  in  general.  The  play,  however,  ends  hap- 
pily, through  a  train  of  events  which  contributes  to 
our  pleasure  by  taxing  our  credulity.  "As  in  all 
the  early  productions  of  Judeo-German  literature," 
says  Wiener,  in  his  account  of  the  play,  "there  are 
in  that  drama  two  distinct  classes  of  characters:  the 
ideal  persons    .     .     .    and  the  real  men  and  women 


338        THE  DRAMA  OF   rRAXSmuN 

who  are  taken  out  of  actual  lite.  On  the  side  of  the 
first  is  all  virtue,  while  among  the  others  are  to  be 
found  the  worst  forms  of  vice."  For  the  rest  the 
characters  are  well  depicted,  and  the  scenes  have 
value  as  contemporary  documents. 

In  Aksenfeld's  The  First  Jewish  Recruit  in  Russia 
(a  drama  in  eight  scenes,  and,  like  his  other  works, 
a  study  in  manners)  we  find  one  ot  the  most  im- 
portant of  this  period's  plays.  We  know  from  con- 
temporary evidence  that  AksenfcKl  wrote  his  pieces 
in  the  second  decade  ot  the  nineteenth  century,  but 
not  until  forty  years  later  were  they  published,  and 
then  in  part  onlv.  The  author  hati  been  a  personal 
witness  to  the  terror  among  the  Jews  when  the  ukase 
of  1827  was  promulgated  by  Nicholas  I,  requiring 
each  Jewish  community  to  contribute  its  share  of 
recruits  to  the  imperial  army.  These  terror-stricken 
figures  move  through  the  drajna,  while  their  leaders, 
with  the  hope  that  springs  eternal,  see  in  the  com- 
munal calamity  an  opportunity  tor  the  Jews  so  to 
distinguish  themselves  in  battle  as  to  win  from  the 
monarch  concessions  for  their  oppressed  race.  It  is 
finally  decided  that  since  someone  must  be  sent  to 
the  army,  it  may  as  well  be  Nakhman,  who  is  the 
terror  of  the  town  because  of  his  propensity  for 
practical  jokes.  The  better  to  accomplish  this, 
Nakhman  is  induced  to  volunteer  himself  through 
his  love  for  Frume,  the  beautiful  daughter  of  the 
tax-collector,  as  he  has  been  told  that  his  bravery 
will  be  the  condition  of  her  acceptance.  As  luck 
will  have  it,  Frume  really  loves  Nakhman,  and  when 
she  hears  of  the  practical  joke  that  has  been  played 
upon  the  practical  joker,  she  suffers  all  the  pangs  of 
torture,  but  hides  her  woes,  finally  dying  from  her 


THE  YIDDISH  DRAMA  339 

unuttered  sorrow,  Nakhman's  mother,  discovering 
the  deception  practiced  upon  her  simple-minded  son, 
comes  to  the  home  of  her  son's  lover  only  to  stumble 
upon  Frume's  corpse.  In  a  touching  scene,  where 
Nakhman's  mother  addresses  the  dead  body,  the 
play  closes. 

The  theme  of  recruiting  is  naturally  as  popular  in 
Yiddish  literature  as  it  was  unpopular  in  Jewish 
life,  and  early  appeared  in  J.  B.  Levinsohn's  essay 
Die  Hefker  Welt  (The  Topsy-Turvy  World,  1828, 
circulated  in  mss.  form),  which  has  been  called  by 
Pines  the  first  original  production  of  this  epoch. 
This  work,  in  some  respects  a  Jewish  Utopia^  con- 
tains, among  other  things,  complaints  against  com- 
munal grafters  and  recruiting  abuses  whereby  the 
sons  of  the  rich  escaped  service.  These  find  a  most 
powerful  echo  some  thirty  years  later  in  the  most 
important  play  of  the  period  preceding  the  founding 
of  the  Yiddish  stage — Abramovitsch's  The  Meat 
Tax.  Here  the  reformatory  spirit  of  the  times  reaches 
its  highest  dramatic  and  most  significant  social  ex- 
pression, not  by  drawing  only  from  the  religious  life 
of  the  day,  but  also  from  the  political. 

It  was  Abramovitsch  who  brought  to  the  Yiddish 
language  and  style  a  beauty,  a  capacity  for  expres- 
sion which  finally  effected  its  triumph  as  a  literary 
medium.  From  the  beginning  he  had  felt  a  call  to 
serve  God  through  serving  man.  "It  appears,"  he 
says  in  his  reminiscences,  "that  from  very  birth  I 
was  destined  to  play  the  role  of  writer  for  my  people 
— a  poor  and  wretched  people.  And  in  order  that 
I  might  know  this  life  in  its  entirety,  early  in  life 
God  said  to  me,  'Go,  my  little  bird,  fly  about  the 
world  and  be  the  unhappiest  of  the  unhappy — the 


340        THE  DRAMA  OK  TRAN^l  1  lUN 

most  Jewish  of  Jews.'  "  Abramovitsch  differs  from 
the  preceding  writers  in  emphasizing  the  necessity 
for  proper  material  conditions  before  spiritual  ex- 
pansion is  possible.  In  conformity  with  such  an 
economic  tenet  he  turned  his  attention  to  communal 
improvement,  and  his  Meat  Tax  is  a  powerful  ex- 
ample of  Yiddish  social  drama — powerful  not  only 
intrinsically,  but  in  its  immediate  effect  upon  the 
conditions  and  the  persons  against  whom  it  was 
written. 

The  play  is  founded  upon  the  meat  and  candle 
tax,  then  one  of  the  greatest  hardships  of  the  Jewish 
community,  for  both  articles  are  much  in  demand. 
The  tax  was  farmed  out  to  the  ka/ia/ y  the  body  which 
ostensibly  represented  the  Jewish  community,  and 
was  supposed  to  go  to  the  support  of  certain  com- 
munal institutions.  Altogether  too  much  of  it,  how- 
ever, found  its  way  into  the  kahal  pockets. 

In  the  figure  of  Spodek,  the  ring-leader  of  the 
kahal  grafters,  Abramovitsch  has  created  a  Yiddish 
minor  Tartiijfe.  Outwardly  Spodek  is  a  man  of 
holiest  thought  and  deed,  but  he  knows  the  value 
of  a  cringing  manner  and  a  pious  lamentation.  He 
knows,  too,  that  he  profits  most  from  his  fellow-men 
when  he  seems  most  humble, —  that  beneath  his 
mask  as  a  social  benefactor  lurks  the  grin  of  the 
communal  parasite. 

There  is  a  striking  episode.  Act  II,  scene  III, 
where  the  members  of  the  kahal  are  discussing  the 
details  of  a  newly  planned  tax.  Suddenly  the  news 
is  brought  that  the  government  has  sent  an  auditor 
to  look  over  accounts.  Spodek,  inwardly  over- 
whelmed at  the  possibilities  suggested  by  the  un- 
pleasant announcement,  affects  the  religious  whine 


THE  YIDDISH  DRAMA  341 

which  precedes  his  greatest  perfidies.  "Alas,"  he 
begins,  with  blasphemous  piety,  "how  dire  is  our 
exile!  Here  comes  an  auditor  to  examine  our  ac- 
counts! It  is  because  of  our  sins  that  we  are  in 
exile.  May  God — praised  by  his  name — have  pity 
on  us.  .  .  .  With  God's  help,"  he  adds,  signifi- 
cantly, "everything  can  be  arranged.  Do  you  under- 
stand?" His  companions  understand.  For  Mam- 
mon is  the  god  whose  help  Spodek  means  to  invoke, 
and  Russian  officials,  like  Pooh  Bah,  are  ever  ready 
to  be  "grossly  insulted"  by  the  healing  bribe. 

Wecker,  the  young  hero  of  the  play,  is  an  up-to- 
date  fellow  who  has  been  in  Spodek's  employ  and 
knows  that  worthy's  methods  only  too  well.  He 
tries  to  arouse  the  people  against  their  grafter- 
"benefactors,"  only  to  be  met  on  all  sides  by  igno- 
rance, indifference,  cowardice,  submission.  There  is 
nothing  left  for  him  to  do  but  abandon  the  fight, 
placing  his  hope  for  the  future  in  the  beneficent 
actions  of  the  government. 

Aksenfeld's  First  Jewish  Recruit  had  expressed  a 
similar  faith  in  the  government's  protective  powers. 
This  trust  is  one  of  the  characteristics  of  the  Has- 
kalite  literature.  At  the  time  Abramovitsch  wrote 
The  Meat  Tax  the  anti-Jewish  riots  of  1881  were 
still  far  off,  yet  the  dramatist  himself,  in  his  noted 
prose  work  Die  Kliatsche  {The  Bobbin)^  foresaw  the 
miseries  in  store  for  his  people. 

We  find,  then,  that  the  Jewish  literature  in  dra- 
matic form  which  was  written  in  the  era  that  pre- 
ceded the  founding  of  the  Yiddish  stage  by  Abra- 
ham Goldfaden  was  characterized  by  a  didactic 
strain,  drawing  upon  actual  life  and  actual  problems. 
It  was  sporadic  and  reformatory  in  nature,  and  in 


342        THE  DRAMA  OF  TRANSITION 

the  case  of  The  Meat  Tax  actually  became  a  power  in 
social  conditions.  So  well  did  this  play  perform  its 
mission  that  the  role  of  Spodek  was  recognized  in 
real  life  and  the  sanctimonious  grafter's  prototype 
was  forced  into  bankruptcy  by  an  outraged  popula- 
tion. 

Owing  to  the  peculiar  conditions  with  which  Gold- 
faden  had  to  contend,  Jewish  drama  soon  took  a 
direction  quite  different  from  that  so  promisingly 
indicated  in  these  early  plays.  The  serious  element 
of  the  drama  resolved  itself  into  almost  a  stereo- 
typed repetition  of  Haskalite  arguments  against  the 
Khassidim,  while  the  comic  element,  plus  song  and 
dance,  assumed  first  place.  Goldfaden  and  his 
followers  wrote  for  a  seeing  and  listening  public, 
>.^not  for  a  reading  and  thinking  individual,  under 
circumstances  which  are  best  examined  in  connec- 
tion with  the  life  of  the  man  who  adapted  them  to 
the  crowning  achievement  of  his  career. 

II 

Even  as  the  Yiddish  stage  furnishes  one  of  the 
most  absorbing  by-paths  in  the  lore  of  the  drama, 
so  is  the  figure  of  its  founder,  Abraham  Goldfaden,' 
one  of  the  most  picturesque  in  modern  theatrical 
history.  Had  he  never  written  anything  other 
than  poetry,  he  would  be  gratefully  remembered  by 
his  fellow-men  for  his  two  allegorical  poems,  which 
glorify  his  religion  and  its  Sabbath,  and  his  numerous 
lesser  writings,  all  replete  with  a  spirit  of  modern, 
yet  fundamental  Judaism.     His  popular  songs  have 

.         '  The  name  was  originally  Goldenfadim,  and  was  changed  by  him  to  Golden- 
\}  faden  and  finally  to  Goldfaden. 


THE  YIDDISH  DRAMA  343 

sung  themselves  into  the  hearts  of  his  people,  where, 
too,  he  himself  has  found  a  place. 

Abraham  Goldfaden  was  born  on  July  12,  1840, 
at  Old  Constantin,  in  the  southern  part  of  Russia, 
government  of  Volhynia.  His  father  being  a  staunch 
adherent  of  the  Haskala,  the  son  grew  up  in  an  at- 
mosphere of  enlightenment,  and  his  early  education, 
besides  Hebrew — in  which  he  showed  his  poetic 
powers  at  the  age  of  ten — included  Russian  and 
German,  with  Yiddish,  of  course,  as  the  domestic 
tongue. 

At  the  government  school  Goldfaden  became 
friendly  with  his  teacher,  Gottlober,  the  well-known 
poet  and  dramatic  author.  The  latter,  besides 
writing  Hebrew  verse,  set  the  lines  to  music  himself, 
and  encouraged  his  pupil  in  similar  pursuits.  From 
Gottlober,  too,  Goldfaden  imbibed  a  love  of  the 
drama,  which  is  later  evidenced  by  plays  which 
reveal  the  direct  influence  of  the  instructor. 

Another  important  influence  in  firing  the  lad's 
enthusiasm  for  dramatic  representation  was  a  play 
performed  in  1855  at  the  Rabbinical  college,  whither 
he  had  been  sent  upon  completing  his  grades  with 
distinction  at  the  community  school.  This  drama, 
written  by  one  Kamrasch,  was  given  in  honor  of 
Alexander  II's  coronation,  and  depicted  the  life  of 
a  Jewish  soldier  and  the  environment  of  the  Jewish 
folk.  The  entire  student  body  had  been  enthused 
with  the  Thespian  spirit  as  the  result  of  other 
Jewish  teachers'  successes  at  Berdichev,  and  the 
event  made  a  deep  impression  upon  the  fifteen-year- 
old  Talmudist,  who  soon  became  acquainted  with 
Ettinger's  Serkele  and  stored  it  up,  perhaps  un- 
consciously, with  the  host  of  other  impressions  that 


344        THE  DRAMA  OF  TRANSITION 

were  later  to  show  themselves  in  his  work  for  the 
stage. 

At  college  Goldfaden  was  very  popular.  Daily 
the  students  would  gather  in  the  arched  halls  and 
sing  in  sonorous  voices  the  Hebrew  and  Yiddish 
songs  of  their  talented  colleague.  In  1865  appeared 
Goldfaden's  first  collection  of  Hebrew  proems,  and 
in  the  following  year,  which  witnessed  also  the  com- 
pletion of  his  studies  at  Zhitomir,  was  published  his 
initial  group  of  Yiddish  poems,  under  the  title  Dos 
Yidele  {The  Jew). 

The  end  of  Goldfaden's  studies  was  the  beginning 
of  his  trials.  Soon  disgusted  with  his  position  as 
government  teacher,  which  yielded  the  princely  sum 
of  almost  ten  dollars  per  month,  he  abandoned  the 
profession  for  untlertakings  in  various  directions  with 
much  more  versatility  than  success.  We  discover 
him  now  as  cashier  (by  this  time  he  is  married), 
now  as  proprietor  of  a  large  millinery  establishment, 
now  plunged  into  bankruptcy,  with  only  his  bitter 
experience  as  an  asset.  For  a  time  his  eyes  turn 
toward  Munich,  where  the  medical  profession 
beckons,  but  fortunately  the  world  is  spared  a  bad 
doctor.  Only  one  makeshift  presents  itself,  and 
Goldfaden  enters  journalism.  His  first  venture  (the 
humorous  journal  Yisrolik,  established  in  conjunc- 
tion with  Linetzki,'  author  of  the  widely  read 
Yiddish  satiric  classic  The  Polish  Boy)  is  throttled 
by  the  Russian  government  after  six  months,  and 
he  moves  from  Lemburg  to  Czernowitch,  where,  in 
1876,  he  issues  the  Bukowiner  Israelitischer  Volks- 
blatt.  Matters  go  from  bad  to  worse,  and  Goldfaden 
seems  at  the  end  of  his  resources,  yet  this  is  the  very 

K»/^f\*h'"v'J^^-j-"'^  ^''^^  '^  ^*  '*^^  '"O'"*  effective  since  it  proceed*  from  a  mem- 
ber  of  the  kiassidic  sect  that  is  pilloried. 


THE  YIDDISH  DRAMA  345 

year  which  is  to  bring  him  distinction.  He  receives 
a  letter  from  one  of  his  Roumanian  subscribers,  Mr. 
Librescu,  urging  him  to  come  to  Yassy,  where 
dwells  the  largest  Jewish  population  in  the  country, 
and  where  a  journalistic  venture  may  bear  more 
fruit.  The  drowning  journalist  grasps  at  the  finan- 
cial straw  and  goes  to  Yassy. 

Before  we  follow  him  thither,  let  us  take  a  ghmpse 
at  the  two  plays  which  he  had  already  written  under 
the  inspiration  of  Gottlober  and  Ettinger. 

The  Two  Neighbors  and  Aunt  Sosie  were  published 
in  1872,  and  are  both  in  comic,  even  farcical,  vein. 
The  first  is  just  a  dialogue  between  two  friends 
whose  little  ones  are  playing  on  the  floor.  In  honied 
phrases  the  women  express  their  intimate  regard 
for  one  another,  and  with  maternal  fondness  look 
forward  to  the  time  when  they  shall  dance  at  their 
children's  wedding.  But  the  harmonious  ecstasies 
of  the  parents  are  by  no  means  mirrored  in  the 
children,  who,  while  their  parents  have  been  marry- 
ing them  off,  have  started  a  quarrel.  One  of  the 
tots  is  hurt,  whereupon  a  sudden  change  comes  over 
the  mothers.  Each  upholds  the  blamelessness  of 
her  offspring;  kisses,  weddings,  dances — all  are  for- 
gotten. Compliments  yield  to  curses,  and  a  char- 
acteristic scene  of  abuse  ensues.  The  Two  Neighbors 
is  thoroughly  enjoyable  satiric  farce,  with  a  genuine 
insight  into  human  nature. 

Aunt  Sosie,  despite  its  evident  indebtedness  to 
Ettinger's  Serkele,  contains  some  of  Goldfaden's 
best  work,  and  has  been  called  his  masterpiece.  It 
is  based  upon  the  Jewish  life  that  its  author  knew, 
and  is  in  plot  more  complicated  than  Goldfaden's 
later  stage  pieces.     Sosie's  husband  is  a  hen-pecked 


346        THE  DRAMA  OF  TRANSITION 

spouse,  who  nevertheless  succeeds,  by  enlisting 
deceit  in  the  service  of  his  timidity,  in  marrying  off 
his  ill-treated  niece  to  Sosie's  own  brother.  Sosie, 
who  turns  all  her  efforts  to  marrying  off  her  sister, 
finds  out  just  in  time  that  the  Lithuanian  Jew  uj>on 
whom  she  had  looked  as  an  excellent  match,  has 
already  been  married.  The  timid  husband  is  thus 
a  far  better  matchmaker  than  his  termagacious 
mate. 

Goldfaden  did  not  come  to  Roumania  unknown; 
his  songs  were  sung  in  all  the  coffee  houses  and  had 
been  popularized  by  the  balladists  who  constituted, 
outside  of  the  synagogue  firecentors,  the  Jewish 
population's  sole  musical  diversion.  The  taste  of 
this  public  was  little  refined;  from  the  religious 
preachers  it  absorbed,  through  the  synagogue,  the 
serious  thoughts  which  were  part  of  its  daily  life. 
Here,  too,  the  Jews  indulged  their  love  of  music, 
and  a  precentor  who  could  sing  well  was  always 
sure,  as  he  is  to-day,  of  a  large  audience.  For  the 
comic  relief  in  the  drama  of  their  daily  existence 
there  were  the  badkhcns,  or  wedding-jesters — parlor 
entertainers  whose  powers  of  improvisation  some- 
times reached  artistic  significance.'  The  lieder- 
singers  in  the  restaurants  pursued  similar  methods. 

These  singers,  however,  were  not  merely  vocalists. 
Their  work  comprised  not  only  songs,  but  called 
also  for  a  certain  amount  of  acting  ability,  since  the 
songs  were  sung  in  costume,  accompanied  by  ap- 
propriate facial  expressions  and  gestures.  It  was 
moreover  a  common  practice  for  a  singer,  if  the 
song  called   for  more   than   one  part,   to  have   the 

'  The  last  of  these  picturesque  improvising  minstrels  was  the  beloved  Eliakum 
Zunser  (1836-1913).  His  collected  work,  in  three  volumes,  exhibits  three  distinct 
strains:  (1)  the  homiletic,  (2)  the  satiric,  (3)  the  nationalistic.  He  is  at  his  be«t 
as  a  spontcineous,  simple  wedding-jester. 


THE  YIDDISH  DRAMA  347 

assistance  of  a  second  person.  We  have  here  the 
practical  beginnings  of  genuine  drama.  Indeed,  it 
was  while  listening  to  such  a  singer  performing  one 
of  his  own  songs  that  the  idea  came  to  Goldfaden  to 
write  out  the  action  of  the  song  in  the  form  of  a 
prose  play. 

Goldfaden's  journalistic  prospects  were  quite  as 
gloomy  in  Roumania  as  they  had  been  elsewhere. 
He  must  have  money.  It  so  happened  that  when 
he  arrived  at  Yassy,  Gradner,  a  singer  of  great 
versatility,  was  giving  a  concert  there.  Goldfaden 
saw  here  an  opportunity  to  sell  a  few  songs,  for  he 
knew  that  Gradner  made  a  specialty  of  singing  some 
of  his  old  ones.  The  playwright  has  left  us  a  hu- 
morous account  of  how,  when  he  broached  the 
matter  to  the  lieder-singer,  he  was  met  with  the 
reply  that  his  only  pay  for  the  poems  would  be  in 
the  popularity  which  Gradner's  singing  would  bring 
to  the  author.  All  of  which,  though  it  soothed  the 
soul,  could  not  still  the  stomach.  But  this  meeting 
was  fraught  with  far  greater  consequences. 

Gradner  was  not  the  common  type  of  lieder- 
singer;  he  succeeded  in  raising  the  standard  of  his 
popular  art.  He  was  not  content  to  be  a  mere 
badkhen  for  the  pleasure  of  wedding  gatherings,  nor 
did  the  narrow  sphere  of  the  coffee  houses  appeal 
to  him.  He  sought  out  the  large  centers,  and  as 
soon  as  he  arrived,  would  hire  a  prominent  location, 
put  up  a  platform,  have  seats  arranged  and  num- 
bered, and  spread  notices  that  he  sang  the  songs 
of  the  most  popular  folk-poets. 

Among  the  latter,  of  course,  Goldfaden  figured. 
In  Gradner,  Goldfaden  was  quick  to  recognize  a 
baritone  voice  of  undeveloped  beauty  and  a  mimick- 


348        THE  DRAMA  OF   IRANSITION 

ing  talent  capable  oi  high  attainments.  Through 
Gradner,  Goldfaden  learned  what  the  public  for 
which  he  would  have  to  write  really  wanted,  and 
that  whatever  attempts  he  might  make  must  be 
based  upon  the  lieder-singers.  He  knew  also  that 
from  certain  quarters  he  must  expect  very  little  aid 
or  sympathy.  The  more  intelligent  class  of  Jews 
was  of  cultured  taste,  preferring  the  Gentile  theatre 
with  its  literary  offerings  and  trained  personnel. 
As  it  had  opjiosed  the  spread  of  the  Yiddish  tongue, 
so  would  it  opjx)se  the  founding  ot  a  Yiddish  stage, 
and  later  fight  that  institution  in  both  Russia  and 
America.  Goldhulcn  must  build  from  the  bottom. 
Accordingly,  hred  by  his  new  idea,  he  sat  down, 
wrote  a  few  songs,  and  set  to  work  immediately  pre- 
paring them  for  performance  with  Gradner,  and  the 
latter's  assistant,  Goldstein. 

This  first  piece  was  built  around  songs.  No  set 
dialogue  was  written  down,  but  more  nr  less  in  the 
fashion  of  the  connnedia  delTarle  the  writer  got  his 
two  chief  actors  together,  gave  them  hints  as  to 
interpretation,  and  suggested  an  outline  of  what- 
ever action  the  piece  contained.  While  the  songs 
were  being  learned  the  dialogue  would  be  worked 
out,  and  if  the  actors  forgot  the  exact  wortls  the 
audience  would  be  none  the  wiser  for  their  impro- 
visations. The  first  play  was  thus  a  mere  hodge- 
podge of  songs,  quarrels,  amorous  complications, 
curses,  and  plenty  of  horse-play.  There  was  the 
inevitable  Khassid,  the  dressing  of  men  in  female 
garb,  and  the  now  traditional  imprecations. 

By  comparison  with  the  two  plays  which  Gold- 
faden published  in  1872,  we  can  easily  see  that  in 
this  first  stage  play,  written  in   1876  and  produced 


THE  YIDDISH  DRAMA  349 

at  Yassy,  the  author  wrote  consciously  down  to  his 
audience.  This  was  an  absolute  necessity  under 
the  circumstances,  if  any  sort  of  stage  at  all  was  to 
be  established.  Goldfaden  soon  went  with  his  men 
to  Batishani.  The  Russo-Turkish  war  was  now  in 
the  air  and  Roumania  was  laying  hands  on  every 
available  Jew  to  press  him  into  service.  Terror 
reigned  in  the  ghetto,  which  was  full  of  Jews  who 
had  escaped  from  Russia  in  order  to  avoid  military 
slavery.  With  difficulty  the  founder  of  the  Yiddish 
stage  himself  eluded  the  hands  of  the  khapers  (catch- 
ers). Productions  naturally  were  not  to  be  thought 
of,  but  as  Goldfaden  lay  in  hiding  he  had  plenty  of 
time  to  consider  his  plans,  and  it  is  not  strange  that 
his  second  attempt  should  take  the  form  of  a  play 
dealing  with  Jewish  recruits. 

Goldfaden's  piece,  however,  is  not,  like  Aksen- 
feld's  on  the  same  theme,  a  drama.  The  action  of 
The  Recruits  is  very  simple,  and  depends,  as  do  all 
of  the  writer's  theatrical  works,  very  largely  upon 
the  songs  interspersed.  The  Jewish  recruits,  in  this 
case,  prove  so  manifestly  useless  for  the  service 
that  they  are  released,  but  not  until  they  have 
furnished  plenty  of  antics  for  the  crowd.  The  fare- 
well of  Zadik,  one  of  the  Jewish  students  who  is 
seized  by  the  khapers,  is  a  parody  on  Joan  of  i\rc's 
farewell  at  the  end  of  the  prologue  in  Schiller's 
Jungfrau  von  Orleans.  Soldier  farewells,  moreover, 
are  very  common  in  Jewish  folk-songs. 

Goldfaden's  fortunes,  or  perhaps  misfortunes, 
brought  him  soon  to  Bucharest.  Here,  at  the  head- 
quarters of  the  Russian  staff  Jews  had  gathered 
from  all  points  to  make  a  living  in  wartime  activ- 
ities.    Goldfaden,  adding  to  his  company,  and  tak- 


350        THE  DI^MA  OF  TRANSITION 

ing  advantage  of  the  community's  humors,  hastily 
concocted  some  very  Hght  pabulum  for  the  palates 
of  these  wearied  men  of  affairs.  The  pieces  are  of 
meagre  plot  and  worth,  and  moreover  have  little 
inner  connection  with  Jewish  life.  They  consist 
mainly  of  couplets  set  to  music  by  the  author,  plus 
situations  suggested  for  the  most  part  by  French 
originals  which  Goldfaden  used  as  models.  The 
songs  are  still  popular,  though  few  who  sing  them 
know  their  origin. 

It  was  at  Bucharest  where  Goldfaden  remained 
until  the  end  of  the  Russo-Turkish  war  (1878)  that 
he  formed  the  acquaintance  of  the  talented  actor, 
Mogalesco,  whom  he  persuaded  to  remain  upon  the 
Jewish  stage.  Here,  too,  Gradner,  because  of  pro- 
fessional jealousy  of  Mogalesco,  and  not  entirely 
without  proper  personal  reasons,  left  Goldfaden  for 
good. 

From  Bucharest  Goldfaden  went  to  Odessa,  where, 
at  the  Maryinski  theatre,  his  company  met  with 
immediate  success.  Other  writers  were  attracted, 
among  them  Katzenellenbogen  (perhaps  the  most 
original  of  the  number),  Lerner,  Lillicnblum,  and 
Shaikewitsch.  The  dramas  of  this  period,  though 
not  ot  great  intrinsic  merit,  were  better  than  the 
products  soon  tp  flourish  in  America.  Lerner's 
adaptations  of  German  pieces  such  as  U?icle  Moses 
Mendelssohn  and  Gutzkow's  Uriel  Acosta,  partic- 
ularly the  latter,  proved  very  popular. 

The  financial  success  of  the  theatre  at  Odessa, 
however,  prepared  the  way  for  the  rapid  downfall 
of  the  Yiddish  theatre  in  Russia.  Actors  and  ac- 
tresses became  unduly  impressed  with  the  idea  of 
their  own  importance  and  began  to  demand  salaries 


THE  YIDDISH  DRAMA  351 

commensurate  with  their  conceited  notions.  Dissen- 
sions arose  and  the  original  troupe  divided  in  two, 
Goldfaden  taking  the  directorship  of  the  first,  while 
Lerner  took  charge  of  the  second. 

Goldfaden  now  undertook  a  tour  of  the  principal 
cities  of  Russia,  meeting  with  varying  success.  In 
some  places  he  was  welcomed  by  the  Jewish  popula- 
tion, while  in  others  the  troupe  met  with  the  opposi- 
tion of  the  more  cultured  element,  who  looked  upon 
the  project  as  a  retrogressive  influence.  During  this 
time,  in  order  to  provide  a  wider  repertory  of  some- 
what more  substantial  appeal,  Goldfaden  wrote 
Doctor  Almosadoy  Bar  Kochba,  and  Shulamith.  With 
the  last  two  pieces,  says  Seiffert,  Goldfaden  "made 
himself  immortal,  and  secured  for  the  Yiddish  stage 
a  long  future.  Even  more  than  the  historical  sub- 
ject, the  sweet  music,  the  genuinely  Jewish  melody, 
achieved  the  greatest  success.  Later  they  were 
translated  into  Polish  and  produced  at  the  Polish 
opera  with  the  most  gratifying  effect.  These  two 
pieces  are  the  quintessence  of  the  entire  Jewish 
repertory." 

Meanwhile  matters  connected  with  the  Yiddish 
stage  were  going  from  bad  to  worse.  As  if  internal 
intrigues  were  not  enough,  it  is  averred  by  some 
that  Gentile  actors,  jealous  of  the  Jewish  successes, 
whispered  into  the  official  ears  that  the  Yiddish 
stage  was  a  hot-bed  of  revolution.  The  Russian 
minister  wearied  of  reading  all  the  evidence  sub- 
mitted to  him  by  the  rival  companies;  on  the  14th 
of  September,  1883,  a  decree  was  issued  in  which 
the  further  continuance  of  the  Yiddish  stage  was 
forbidden.  "Like  a  father  in  despair,"  Goldfaden 
has  written,  "I  rushed  to  St.  Petersburg  to  beg  mercy 


352        THE  DRAMA  OF  TRANSITION 

for  the  child  of  my  spirit.  It  was  all  in  vain."  For 
a  short  time  the  decree  was  evaded  at  Warsaw  by 
giving  the  Yiddish  plays  in  a  so-called  "German" 
theatre,  but  a  second  ukase  put  an  end  to  this  sub- 
terfuge. The  career  of  the  Yiddish  theatre  in 
Russia  had  thus  lasted  but  five  years. 

The  more  mature  pieces  by  Goldfaden  forsake 
French  models  for  German,  and  draw  their  inspira- 
tion from  the  Bible  or  from  history.  The  songs 
from  some  of  these  form  part  of  every  Jew's  heritage. 
As  composer,  Goldfaden  is  distinguished  for  a  tender, 
lyric  melancholy  which  reaches  straight  to  the  heart 
of  singer  and  hearer  alike.  Through  these  songs 
he  lives  in  the  hearts  of  his  people  in  a  very  vital 
and  enduring  sense. 

In  his  later  European  and  American  activities 
Goldfaden  added  nothing  substantial  to  his  achieve- 
ments. In  him  the  man  and  his  work  were  so  in- 
timately fused  that  a  full  appreciation  of  the  one 
is  possible  only  through  a  knowledge  of  the  other. 
When,  in  1908,  he  died  in  New  York,  he  left  behind 
an  intellectual  legacy  that  will,  after  all  is  said  and 
done,  consist  of  two  or  three  stageworthy  produc- 
tions, numerous  folk-songs,  a  fair  variety  of  poems, 
and  the  historical  distinction  of  having  laid  the 
foundations  of  a  Yiddish  drama  that  for  too  long 
remained  without  any  worthy  superstructure. 

Goldfaden  had  come  among  an  ignorant  public 
whose  tastes  were  of  the  most  uncultured.  He  had 
quickly  discerned  the  elements  in  their  amusements 
which  could  be  fused  into  a  stage,  and  had  set  about 
the  work  with  astonishing  energy.  Himself  without 
experience  as  an  actor,  he  developed  his  raw  material 


THE  YIDDISH  DRAMA  353 

into  an  aggregation  that  scored  success  wherever  it 
appeared.  Handicapped,  until  he  came  to  Russia, 
by  the  absence  of  women,  he  trained  men  for  female 
parts.  And  although  his  pieces  are  by  no  means 
realistic  plays,  as  a  producer  he  sought  realistic 
effects.  Thus  the  soldiers  at  the  end  of  the  second 
act  in  The  Recruits  were  real  soldiers,  hired  for  the 
occasion,  since  our  producer  feared  to  entrust  the 
part  to  civilians.  Wherever  possible  in  such  minor 
roles,  Goldfaden  would  seek  out  in  private  life  the 
very  types  for  which  the  play  called,  and  train  them 
for  the  production.  As  an  example  of  this,  Gorin 
relates  an  anecdote  of  Goldfaden  and  a  cobbler, 
told  to  him  by  the  playwright  himself.  In  one  of 
the  early  plays  a  cobbler  was  needed  to  portray  a 
quarrel.  The  part  was  more  than  mere  "suping," 
and  Goldfaden  was  short  of  actors.  Setting  out 
about  town,  he  found  a  poor  fellow  at  his  bench, 
told  him  the  plot  then  and  there,  rehearsed  him, 
put  him  on  the  stage,  and  made  an  actor  of  him. 
To  train  synagogue  singers  into  theatrical  choruses 
was  of  course  an  easy  matter  for  a  man  who,  in  his 
early  productions,  acted  himself,  built  his  own  stage, 
and  painted  the  scenery! 

Whatever  there  is  of  serious  thought  in  Gold- 
faden may  be  found  in  all  the  popular  poets  of  his 
day,  and  is  usually  part  of  the  HaskaHte  prop- 
aganda. Here  Goldfaden  strikes  no  new  note. 
The  real  contribution  of  his  pieces  lies  in  the  gen- 
uine folk-humor  and  the  caricatures  of  Yiddish 
types.  Some  of  the  latter  have  furnished  new  ex- 
pressions to  the  Yiddish  tongue,  and  a  Kuni-Lemel, 
as  a  byword  for  an  awkward,  inconsequential  sim- 
pleton is  just  as  well  known  to  Jews  as  is,  for  in- 

23 


354        THE  DRAMA  OF  TRANSITIOxV 

stance,  among  the  English,  Pooh-Bah  as  a  type  of 
grasping  politician. 

The  first  to  write  for  the  Jewish  stage,  Goldfaden 
impressed  his  form  upon  all  his  ijnmediate  suc- 
cessors, thus  founding  a  distinct  school.  The  rhym- 
ing couplets,  the  song  and  dance,  the  horse-play, 
the  jester-type  (containing  points  of  resemblance  to 
the  Spanish  gracioso  as  well  as  to  the  Elizabethan 
clown) — may  all  be  traced  to  those  separate  ele- 
ments in  the  diversion  of  the  Roumanian  Jews  which 
Goldfaden  found  ready  to  hand  for  combination. 
This  pattern  was  to  cling  to  the  Yiddish  stage  with 
a  grip  that  long  stifled  all  genuine  pnjgress  towards 
the  legitimate  drama. 

Ill 

Since  1 908  the  government  of  the  Czar  had  not 
been  so  strict  in  its  attitude  towards  the  Yiddish 
theatre.  The  effects  of  the  rescripts  of  1883,  ^"w- 
V  ever,  were  to  disperse  the  actors  and  to  shift  the 
scene  of  the  Yiddish  drama  to  America,  whither  a 
large  host  of  Jews  had  emigrated  to  escape  from 
persecution. 

The  development  of  the  Yiddish  theatre  in  America 
is  practically  synonymous  with  the  development  of 
the  Yiddish  stage  in  New  York.  The  larger  Jewish 
centres,  like  Chicago  and  Boston,  now  have  com- 
panies visit  them  for  shorter  or  longer  stays,  but 
the  dominant  influence  is  naturally  that  of  the 
metropolis  which  contains  almost  half  the  Jews  in 
the  United  States. 

Boris  Tomasheffsky,  to  whose  enterprise  the  foun- 
dation of  the  Yiddish  theatre  in  America  is  due, 
had  been  one  of  the  early  Russian-Jewish  immigrants 


THE  YIDDISH  DRAMA  355 

into  this  country.  It  was  he  who  effected  the 
transference  of  a  London  Yiddish  troupe  to  New 
York,  and  presented  it,  amidst  almost  insuperable 
difficulties,  to  an  audience  that  filled  the  Fourth 
Street  Turner  Hall.  Due  to  the  intrigues  of  the 
Jewish  opposition,  however,  the  performance  fell 
flat  and  the  company  disbanded. 

The  history  of  the  various  theatrical  ventures  and 
ensuing  rivalries  presents  too  many  details  to  be 
entered  into  at  length.  They  may  be  epitomized, 
however,  in  the  competition  between  the  com- 
panies that  finally  occupied  respectively  the  Bowery 
Garden,  renamed  the  Oriental  Theatre,  and  the 
National  Theatre,  renamed  the  Roumanian  Opera 
House.  With  the  Oriental  Company  came  Lateiner 
as  staff  playwright.  The  Roumanian  Opera  House 
Company  arrived  in  1886,  their  staff  writer,  Hur- 
witz,  following  soon  after.  In  general,  the  plays 
given  by  the  first  troupe  were  better  than  those 
offered  by  the  second,  while  in  the  matter  of  acting 
the  case  was  reversed.  Gradually,  because  of  this 
superiority  in  acting,  the  Roumanian  Opera  House 
forced  the  Oriental  Company  into  the  background. 

The  rivalry  between  these  two  houses  was  not 
slow  in  producing  evil  effects  analogous  to  those 
which  had  helped  to  disrupt  the  stage  in  Russia. 
Hurwitz,  especially,  was  quite  unscrupulous  in  his 
methods.  The  rivalry  took  on  an  amusing  phase  in 
the  fashion  of  singing  couplets  at  one  theatre  an- 
tagonistic to  the  fortunes  of  the  other.  These 
couplets  were  obtruded  into  the  plays  without  any 
concern  as  to  their  inappropriateness  to  the  action, 
and  found  further  extension  in  the  campaign  of 
scurrilous    handbills    which    was    initiated.      Actors 


356        THE  DIl.'^MA  OF  TRANSITION 

were  enticed  from  one  side  to  the  other,  and  cases 
are  recorded  where  a  player  would  appear  in  one 
act  at  one  theatre  and  in  the  following  act  at  the 
^     other  playhouse! 

At  this  time  the  coming  of  Goldfadcn  might  have 
had  salutary  effects,  but,  due  to  the  hostilities,  he 
was  excluded  altogether.  He  left  New  York  in 
disgust,  and  was  soon  replaced  by  Shaikewitsch, 
1  who  could  write  a  play  "while  you  wait."  The  latter 
'  ground  out  one  production  alter  the  other  for  the 
Roumanian  Opera  House  troupe.  The  various  plays 
written  by  the  other  dramatists  of  ihe  time  are  to<:) 
much  alike  in  their  general  unworthincss  to  require 
any  special  mention. 

With  the  arrival  of  Jacob  Gordin  in  the  early 
nineties  came  a  breath  of  new  lilc  into  the  Yiddish 
stage.  The  time  was  ri{->c  for  reaction.  The  plays 
hitherto  produced  were  of  a  type  that  was  fast 
declining  even  from  the  Goldfaden  pattern;  there 
was  no  attempt  to  be  true  to  life.  As  frequently 
happens,  the  pendvilum,  in  the  reaction,  swung  too 
far  in  the  opposite  direction,  and  Gordin's  welcome 
introduction  of  realism  often  degenerated  into  a 
riot  of  sensationalism  and  grotcsquerie.  On  the 
whole,  however,  he  exercised  upon  the  stage  an  in- 
fluence decidedly  beneficial,  and  initiated  a  new 
epoch.  His  works  repay  special  treatment,  and  will 
therefore  be  reserved  for  the  fourth  section  of  this 
introductory  outline. 

There  soon  came  a  rage  for  the  classics,  not  with- 
out its  ultimate  benefit  to  the  public  taste.  The 
actors,  advertised  as  the  equals  of  Booth,  Salvini, 
Irving,  found  in  Goethe,  Schiller,  Shakespeare,  and 
others  an  opportunity  for  indulging  their  histrionic 


THE  YIDDISH  DRAMA  357 

conceit.  The  most  popular  plays  of  this  period, 
judging  from  the  financial  returns,  were  Othello^ 
Hamlet^  and  Romeo  and  Juliet.  Of  two  versions  of 
Hamlet,  one  is  quite  close;  in  the  other,  Hamlet  is 
transformed  into  a  Rabbinical  student,  with  an 
uncle  conspiring  to  have  him  sent  to  Siberia  as  a 
nihihst.  Of  course  the  uncle  himself  meets  that  dire 
fate,  while  Hamlet  dies  of  a  broken  heart.  The 
classics  prepared  the  way  for  the  denationalization 
of  the  stage,  and  its  degeneration  through  box- 
office  standards. 

Since  the  first  days  of  the  stage  in  New  York 
changes  in  theatres,  in  troupes,  and  in  plays  have 
been  many.  Of  the  numerous  actors,  some  have 
become  known  outside  their  particular  environment 
and  have  won  the  approbation  of  American  critics. 
Most  prominent  is  the  veteran  Jacob  Adler.  To 
him  belongs  much  of  the  credit  for  obtaining  a  hear- 
ing for  Gordin.  A  lover  of  realism  himself,  he  rec- 
ognized the  merits  of  its  Yiddish  dramatic  expo- 
nent. Tomasheffsky,  as  actor,  has  been  found 
wanting  in  expressional  power  and  miming  capacity. 
He  represented  formerly  the  best  Yiddish  type  of 
matinee  idol,  and  was  the  actor  and  the  type  for 
whom  Lateiner  wrote  his  hero  roles.  Bertha  Kalish 
is  known  favorably  to  the  English  stage,  although 
she  confesses  a  marked  preference  for  the  Yiddish 
audience.  The  Yiddish  stage  has  undoubtedly  pro- 
duced, in  its  short  career,  some  half-dozen  artists 
that  would,  if  they  acted  in  a  tongue  more  widely 
known,  have  achieved  far  greater  distinction. 

As  for  "Moishe" — Moses — that  collective  name  by 
which  the  less  discriminating  part  of  the  Jewish 
audience  is  known — he  is  a  fellow  at  once  difficult 


358        THE  DRAMA  OF  TRANSITION 

and  easy  to  please.  Give  him  and  his  female  com- 
panion something  to  laugh  at  (^r  weep  over  (for 
lachrymose  tendencies  form  a  noticeable  weakness 
in  the  Jewish  audience,  even  among  the  men),  and 
he  is  content.  But  if  you  please  him  not,  he  is  less 
reserved  in  the  expression  of  his  dissatisfaction  than 
is  his  American  neighbor.  The  Jew,  Bertha  Kalish 
has  said  in  an  interview,  "approaches  the  theatre 
^^  with  a  great  love,  particularly  lor  his  favorite  player. 

He  listens  attentively.  More  than  that,  he  is  fig- 
uratively on  the  stage  in  the  very  scene,  a  tense 
spectator.  If  a  line  or  situation  doesn't  ring  true, 
he  shakes  his  head.  If  it  gets  him  down  where  he 
lives,  he  is  silent  or  yells  as  the  reacticjn  takes 
direction." 

The  dramatic  output  from  the  beginning  of 
Tomasheffsky  to  the  coming  of  Gordin  is  merely  a 
continuation,  or  even  a  dilution,  of  the  Goldfaden 
model.  With  the  freedom  of  thought  and  worship 
in  America  the  necessity  for  Haskalite  agitation  had 
vanished,  but  nothing  had  been  found  to  replace 
this  serious  element  of  previous  plays.  The  epoch, 
dominated  by  Hurwitz  and  Lateiner,  was  one  of 
great  activity  but  of  no  permanent  accomplishment. 
With  all  his  talk  of  technique  and  his  derogatory 
reception  ol  Gordin's  progressive  plays,  Hurwitz 
wrote  nothing  that  will  live.  Lateiner,  less  preten- 
tious, but  scarcely  less  productive,  is  in  the  same 
class  with  his  rival.  The  first,  specializing  on  what 
he  called  the  "culture"  play — well  termed  by  a 
Gentile  critic  the  "sentimental  representation  of 
inexact  Jewish  history" — is,  if  possible,  the  worse. 


THE  YIDDISH  DRAMA  359 

IV 

Gordin's  original  intention  in  coming  to  the 
United  States  had  been  to  start  a  communist  colony. 
Born  in  1853,  at  Mirgorod,  the  same  town  that  had 
given  birth  to  the  great  Gogol,  Gordin  grew  up  into 
a  lover  of  literature  and  the  drama,  becoming  a 
follower  of  Tolstoi.  Unlike  Goldfaden,  who,  de- 
spite his  reform  beliefs,  was  opposed  to  assimilation, 
Gordin  cherished  the  hope  that  some  way  might 
be  found  for  reconciling  the  Jewish  and  the  Christian 
religions.  The  massacres  of  1 88 1 ,  however,  shattered 
his  syncretist  aims. 

Ten  years  later  he  turned  to  America.  Here  he 
was  quickly  disillusioned  about  the  "golden  land," 
and  found  himself  face  to  face  with  the  dishearten- 
ing problem  of  making  a  living.  Gordin  had  edited 
a  Russian  paper  and  was  well  acquainted  with  the 
literary  and  dramatic  currents  of  his  native  land; 
there  he  had  become  known  as  Ivan  der  Beissende 
(Ivan  the  Incisive)  for  his  biting  style,  so  that  it 
was  natural  for  him  to  take  up  the  pen  as  a  means 
of  support  in  the  new  world. 

His  first  visit  to  a  Yiddish  theatre  in  New  York 
disgusted  him,  and  he  was  impelled  to  write  a  play 
that  would  not  be  a  disgrace  to  the  race.  Whatever 
the  real  value  of  his  first  effort — entitled  Siberia — 
he  made  an  honest  attempt,  as  he  said,  to  fashion 
each  word  a  pure  one  and  each  thought  a  holy  one. 
The  radical  element  of  the  ghetto  received  Gordin's 
drama  with  loud  acclaim;  their  preoccupations  with 
the  sordid  details  of  everyday  life  and  their  knowl- 
edge of  the  best  in  world-literature  rendered  them 
especially  sensitive,  not  only  to  the  need  of  change. 


360        THE  DRAMA  OF  TRANSITION 

but  to  the  appearance  of  its  champion.  Gordin  was 
hailed  as  the  apostle  of  realism. 

The  Jew  is  forced  by  the  pressure  of  his  experience 
to  be  more  or  less  an  eclectic.  Gordin's  career  as 
playwright  illustrates  this  fact  with  str(mg  emphasis. 
He  has  adapted  or  translated  Shakespeare,  Goethe, 
Hebbel,  Ibsen,  Hugo,  Lessing,  Schiller,  Hauptmann, 
Gogol,  Grillparzer,  and  Ostrovsky.  In  many  cases 
the  adaptation  is  in  the  nature  of  a  Yiddish  ana- 
logue suggested  by  the  Gentile  plot.  Gordin  knew 
little  of  the  intimate  lives  of  the  ghetto's  people;  he 
was  never  really  a  part  of  them,  so  that  his  realistic 
endeavors  could  scarcely  look  to  the  creation  of  a 
genuinely  vital  Jewish  play.  What  he  did  seek,  and 
in  a  measure  attain,  was  the  problem  play,  although 
the  Jewish  element  in  the  problem  was  too  often 
superficial. 

Gordin  was  not  truly  a  creative  spirit;  he  could, 
as  an  educated  writer,  galvanize  plays  into  the 
semblance  of  life,  so  to  speak,  and  having  received 
his  training  from  the  Russian  realists,  he  naturally 
fell  into  the  handling  of  the  domestic  problem,  in 
the  style  of  Ostrovsky.  He  certainly  succeeded  in 
making  his  atmospheres  thoroughly  Jewish,  even  if 
the  problems  were  not  always  essentially  racial. 

Gordin's  best  play  is  reckoned  by  many  to  be 
his  Gott^  Mensch  unci  Teifel  (God,  Man^  and  Devil)  ^ 
inspired  by  Faust.  Here,  at  least,  the  German 
classic  is  transformed  into  a  Yiddish  play  with  a 
vital  Jewish  problem — a  play  that  is,  despite  its 
source,  thoroughly  original  and  deserving  of  a  wide 
acquaintance  outside  the  ghetto.  Instead  of  Faust, 
we  have  the  poor  Yiddish  scribe,  Herschele;  instead 
of  a  Mephistopheles  who  tempts  with  the  pleasures 


THE  YIDDISH  DRAMA  361 

of  youthful  passion,  we  have  a  Devil,  who  seeks  to 
purchase  the  scribe's  soul  with  sordid  dollars  and 
cents.  Instead  of  a  Gretchen  who  is  seduced,  we 
have  a  wife  who  is  abandoned  in  favor  of  a  younger, 
more  attractive  woman.  These  changes  from  the 
German  original  operate  also  in  an  altered  environ- 
ment that  raises  the  play  above  mere  imitation. 
Gordin  was  no  Shakespeare,  but  for  once,  in  this 
play,  he  used  another's  plot  to  make  his  own  play. 

The  Devil,  however,  is  cheated  out  of  Herschele's 
soul  at  the  very  moment  of  his  apparent  triumph. 
Despite  the  riches  heaped  upon  him  and  the  business 
career  which  threatens  to  ruin  the  former  scribe's 
finer  self,  an  accident  in  Herschele's  factory,  which 
kills  the  son  of  a  boyhood  friend,  awakens  Herschele 
to  a  sense  of  his  debasement.  With  all  the  power 
that  gold  has  brought  to  him,  with  all  the  domina- 
tion over  his  friends  and  fellow-men,  it  has  taken 
away  something  more  precious — his  joy  in  righteous 
living.  Believing  himself  beyond  redemption,  Her- 
schele hangs  himself.  As  the  Evil  One  is  forced  to 
confess,  "Even  the  power  of  money  is  limited,  for 
though  through  it  man  may  be  deceived,  perverted, 
mutilated  in  soul,  he  cannot  be  ruined  entirely." 
The  piece  stands  out  with  particular  significance 
in  the  repertory  of  a  stage  whose  people  have  been 
unjustly  reputed  to  love  money  above  all  things, 
and  though  it  has  certain  defects,  which  we  shall 
touch  upon  when  we  come  to  Gordin 's  technique, 
it  is  none  the  less  one  of  the  salient  achievements  in 
Jewish  drama. 

Gordin's  adaptation  of  King  Lear  is  far  less  felic- 
itous. As  has  been  noted  by  more  than  one  critic, 
the  piece  has  extent  rather  than  depth;  it  is  spoiled 


362        THE  DRAMA  OF  TRAXSITK^X 

by  the  intrusion  of  the  song-and-dance  element. 
Where  the  great  Bard  portrays  the  agonies  of  a  soul, 
the  Jewish  dramatist  dej^icts  merely  the  external 
sufferings  of  a  body;  Gordin  is  physical  where 
Shakespeare  is  psychological;  the  one  fashions 
events,  where  the  other  creates  character. 

In  the  version  of  Hauptmann's  Fuhrmami  Hen- 
schel,  which  is  known  to  the  Yiddish  stage  as  Die 
Schevoah  {The  Oath),  the  playwright  has  taken  many 
liberties  with  the  original.  .At  the  point  of  death, 
but  with  the  passions  of  life  still  active  within  him, 
a  peasant  exacts  from  his  wife  an  oath  that  she  will 
not  marry  again.  The  oath  is  soon  forgotten,  the 
widow  marrying  her  steward,  who  proves  faithless. 
Only  death  can  end  the  woman's  misfortunes,  and 
when  her  child  is  drowned,  the  only  link  that  con- 
nected her  with  life  is  snapped;  she  burns  the  house 
over  her  head.  As  an  instance  of  the  telling  use 
which  Gordin  makes  of  Jewish  beliefs  and  customs, 
we  have  the  theatrical  scene  where,  at  the  mother's 
second  marriage,  her  young  boy  blows  out  the 
candles  which  are  burning  in  commemoration  of  his 
father's  death  anniversary.  It  is  a  Jewish  super- 
stition that  while  the  anniversary  light  burns  the 
soul  of  the  departed  is  present  and  can  see  all  that 
is  taking  place.  To  extinguish  the  lights  before  the 
twenty-four  hours  of  the  anniversary  have  been 
completed  is  an  impious  act;  but  here  the  simple 
mind  of  the  little  boy,  feeling  that  his  dead  father  is 
witnessing  a  wedding  which  violates  a  sacred  prom- 
ise, blows  out  the  candles  so  that  the  departed  soul 
may  not  behold  the  wife's  infidelity. 

In  the  Jewish  King  Lear  we  have  the  self-sacrific- 
ing father.     In  Mirele  Efros  (looked  upon  by  many 


THE  YIDDISH  DRAMA  363 

as  superior  to  God^  Man,  and  'Devil')  it  is  the  mother 
who  has  sacrificed  herself  to  the  upbringing  of  chil- 
dren only  to  see  them  depart  from  the  maternal 
guidance.  The  father  of  the  Jewish  King  Lear  sinks 
into  insignificance  beside  Mirele  the  mother.  Mirele 
is  perhaps  the  one  instance  in  Gordin's  career  as 
playwright  where  he  built  up  a  complete  character. 
Not  that  the  same  may  be  said  of  the  play  as  a 
whole,  but  here  at  least  the  leading  character  is 
real,  the  events  typically  Jewish,  the  use  of  the  re- 
ligious atmosphere  intensely  effective.  Mirele  grows 
with  the  action;  she  is  not  a  role,  but  a  living  per- 
sonage. 

For  the  rest  there  is  little  comment  to  make  upon 
the  stories  of  Gordin's.  numerous  productions.  He 
covers  a  wide  range  of  problems,  involving  filial 
duty,  religious  faith,  racial  weaknesses,  mixed  mar- 
riages, and  so  on.  He  wanders  from  one  theme  to 
another,  not  as  an  artist  expressing,  like  Ibsen,  for 
example,  his  mental  growth  in  his  dramatic  output, 
but  rather  exploiting  the  ideas  of  others,  or  his  own 
preconceptions,  in  theatrical  guise. 

The  great  contribution  of  Gordin,  then,  to  the 
Yiddish  stage  is  that  in  place  of  the  falsities  of  life 
and  character  that  had  flourished  in  the  Lateiner- 
Hurwitz  regime  he  brought  truth,  character,  art. 
Starting  out  not  far  from  the  beaten  path  of  Gold- 
faden,  he  achieved  a  personality  of  his  own,  despite 
the  intrusion  of  the  vaudeville  element  which  had 
to  be  endured  for  the  sake  of  a  public.  His  plots 
sought  intimate  relation  with  actual  events,  and  if 
they  were  more  complex,  they  were  more  real. 
Even  if  Gordin  did  not  succeed  in  writing  perfect 
technical  compositions,  his  intentions  were  so  evi- 


364        THE  DRAMA  OF  TRANSITION 

dently  sincere,  and  in  such  marked  contrast  to  his 
predecessors  that  intention  alone  ahiiost  equaled 
achievement. 

Gordin's  dialogue  is  noted  for  its  rugged  power, 
as  are  certain  of  his  episodes  for  their  individual 
strength.  Indeed,  Gordin,  in  much  the  same  way 
as  the  Elizabethan  Marlowe  (guarding  proper  dis- 
tances), has  been  looked  upon  primarily  as  a  writer 
of  scenes  rather  than  plays,  and  too  often  of  roles 
rather  than  characters.  His  most  serious  defect 
lies  in  just  this  inability  to  create  character.  The 
beginnings  of  his  plays  are  usually  the  best  part, 
for  here  he  poses  his  problem,  arouses  our  interest, 
and  then — shirks  the  vital  point  in  the  problem. 
He  gives  the  primary  dramatic  impulse,  but  can 
rarely  carry  it  through  to  the  end. 

Thus  in  God,  Ma}i,  mid  Devil,  as  Pinski,'  with 
the  perspicacity  of  the  serious  creative  artist,  has 
pointed  out,  the  one  great  necessity  in  the  play  was 
to  show  Herschele's  first  step  in  his  debasement 
through  the  power  of  gold.  It  is  just  this  step  in  the 
change  which  makes  of  a  pious  Jew  a  conscienceless 
exploiter  that  the  author  shirks.  In  Mirele  Efros 
a  similar  omission  mars  what  would  easilv  have  been 
a  masterpiece  of  character  portrayal.  I-'or  here  the 
author  has  sustained  our  interest  to  the  verv  last, 
only  to  leave  out  the  identical  scene  for  which  he 
has  been  preparing  us  with  a  cumulative  |X)wer 
that  renders  the  spectator  almost  breathless  with 
anticipation.  Will  the  mother  be  reconciled  to 
those  from  whom  she  has  been  estranged?  After 
all  who  could  hope  to  win  her  over  have  been  sent, 
will  she  be  able  to  resist  the  pleadings  of  her  grand- 

>  In  Dos  Yiddtshe  Drama,  New  York,  1909.  This  pamphlet  ia  one  of  the  best 
pieces  of  dramatic  criticism  in  Yiddish. 


THE  YIDDISH  DRAMA  365 

child?  This  is  the  turning  point  in  Mirele's  Hfe; 
it  is  the  great  scene  of  the  play — if  only  it  had  been 
written.  But  no,  instead,  we  have  it  merely  related 
to  us  that  the  grandchild  has  carried  off  victory 
where  his  elders  failed. 

That  Gordin  was  alive  to  his  shortcomings  is 
amply  shown  from  his  own  words.  "I  want  to  say 
publicly,"  he  wrote,  as  early  as  1897,  "that  the 
Yiddish  theatre  will  never  be  in  a  position  to  undergo 
normal  development  as  long  as  the  intellectual 
Jews  continue  to  disregard  a  problem  so  important 
to  the  masses  as  the  upbuilding  of  a  literary,  serious 
stage.  The  Yiddish  theatre,  despite  the  hundreds 
of  thousands  who  form  its  audiences,  cannot  hope 
for  the  arrival  of  a  powerful,  talented  writer  so  long 
as  the  majority  of  its  authors  will,  like  me,  be  men 
who  take  to  dramatic  writing  through  accident, 
who  write  pieces  only  because  they  are  forced  to 
do  so  in  order  to  make  a  living,  and  who,  like  me, 
are  isolated  and  see  about  them  only  ignorance, 
jealousy,  enmity,  and  rancor." 

Gordin  died  in  1909.  Trvie  to  the  eclectic  spirit 
in  which  he  had  at  first  sought  to  reconcile  Judaism 
and  Christianity,  and  later  ransacked  the  world's 
library  for  material,  true  to  his  intensely  theatrical 
instinct,  he  made  his  last  exit,  not  with  a  Jewish 
word  upon  his  tongue  nor  with  his  own  thought, 
but  with  the  closing  Hne  of  /  PagUacci:  "La  com- 
eddia  e  finita" — the  comedy  is  over.  To  his  final 
words  Gordin  was  a  man  of  the  theatre.^ 

>  This  same  story  is  told  of  so  many  men  that,  though  I  record  it,  I  choose  to 
take  it  with  a  grain  of  salt  larger  than  the  usual  dose. 


366        THE  DRAMA  OF  TRANSITION 

V 

His  example  attracted  a  numher  of  followers. 
Although  the  plays  produced  under  this  imperfect 
realistic  influence  are  not  usually  remarkable  for 
art  in  its  deeper  significance,  the  dramatists  were 
learning  how  to  speak,  as  it  were;  they  needed  only 
something  to  say. 

Few  of  Gordin's  disciples  add  anything  to  the 
leader's  accomplishments.  Libin,  for  example,  has 
been  spoken  of  as  the  compromiser  between  the 
Hterary  drama  and  popular  trash,  but  there  is  too 
little  of  literature  in  the  compromise.  His  real  field 
is  the  short  story,  in  which,  together  with  his  con- 
temporary, Kobrin,  he  discovereil  the  new-world 
tenement  to  its  bepuzzled  denizens.  In  a  few  plays 
by  Kobrin  and  Asch,  in  the  dramas  of  Pinski  and 
Hirschbein,  we  find  what  is  best  in  rhe  Yiddish 
drama  of  to-day — a  drama  that  is  practically  di- 
vorced from  the  stage  that  should  have  been  its 
home.  There  is  here  a  triumph  over  the  vulgar 
and  ubiquitous  intrusion  of  the  song-and-dance 
element  that  helped  to  vitiate  even  serious  plays 
ever  since  Goldfaden  started  rhe  fortunes  of  the 
genre;  indeed,  the  thirtl  phase  of  Jewish  drama  con- 
sists in  just  this  liberation  from  the  trammels  of 
badly  mixed  moods,  in  the  attempt  to  treat  vital 
Jewish  themes,  in  attention  to  art  rather  than  to 
mere  substance  as  such.  At  times  the  reaction,  like 
most  early  reactions,  swings  to  extremes,  as  in  some 
of  Hirschbein's  idyllic,  symbolic  sketches,  which  are 
quite  unsuited  to  the  stage.  On  the  whole,  how- 
ever, we  find  in  this  period  the  best  works  that  have 
been  written  for  the  Yiddish  theatre. 


THE  YIDDISH  DRAMA  367 

The  new  impulse  came,  not  from  America,  but 
from  Russia.  Attracted  at  first  by  the  naturahsm 
of  Gorki  and  later  by  the  mystic  symbolism  of 
Andreyev,  the  Jewish  writers  fashioned  works  dis- 
tinctly racial,  at  times  with  a  breath  of  the  universal 
about  them. 

We  may,  in  a  few  words,  dismiss  both  Isaac 
Loeb  Perez  and  Sholom  Aleikhem  as  dramatists. 
The  debt  of  Yiddish  literature  to  both  is  infinite; 
Perez  is  regarded  as  the  peer  of  the  literature,  a 
master  of  many  forms,  and  an  aristocratic  soul  who 
forsook  a  career  in  Russian  letters,  that  he  might 
serve  his  own  humble  folk  with  an  artistry  which — 
ironically  enough — they  will  perhaps  never  fully 
grasp;  Sholom  Aleikhem,  the  greatest  of  the  Yiddish 
folk  humorists,  is  nearer  to  his  people's  hearts  and 
to  their  comprehension.  But  neither  Perez  nor 
Sholom  Aleikhem  was  a  dramatist  of  power  or 
depth.  The  human  touch  was  there,  the  pure  in- 
tention, but  not  the  accompHshment;  they  are  occa- 
sionally produced,  particularly  Sholom  Aleikhem, 
but  they  have  been  without  any  abiding  effect  upon 
the  drama  of  their  people.  The  latter's  short  pieces 
are  little  more  than  sketches;  in  such  a  hodge-podge 
as  The  Divorce  he  strikes  the  muddy  bottom  of 
bathos;  in  Zeseit  und  Zerspreit^  a  play  in  three  acts, 
he  touches  upon  the  dispersion  of  a  Jewish  family: 
the  children  of  Meyer  Shalant  come  to  a  pretty  bad 
end,  Volodia  being  arrested  as  a  revolutionary, 
Khayim  going  to  Palestine  as  a  laborer,  Khanna  pre- 
ferring study  to  marriage,  Matvey  mingling  in  evil 
company.  Flora  eloping.  There  is  a  resemblance  to 
Naidenov's  The  Children  of  Vaniushin. 

For  the  better  drama  of  more  recent  days,  then. 


368        THE  DRAMA  OF  TRAXSITIUN 

we  must  look  to  Leon  Kobrin,  Sholom  Asch,  David 
Pinski,  Perez  Hirschbein,  and  to  a  few  new  pieces 
that  have  been  brought  to  the  attention  of  Jewish 
audiences  in  America  through  such  pioneers  as 
Maurice  Schwartz  and  such  institutions  as  The 
Jewish  Art  Theatre. 

LEON  KOBRIN 

Kobrin  was  born  some  fifty  years  ago  in  Vitebsk, 
White  Russia.  As  early  as  his  fifteenth  year  he  hail 
begun  to  write  sketches  and  tales  in  Russian.  Emi- 
grating to  the  United  States  in  1S92,  he  commenced 
the  following  year  to  pen  stories  in  Yiddish,  baseil 
upon  the  New  World  atmosphere,  which  he  was 
one  of  the  earliest  to  bring  into  Yiddish  letters.  For, 
during  his  first  six  years  in  this  country,  he  engaged, 
with  as  little  patience  as  success,  in  shirtmaking, 
breadbaking,  weaving,  and  newspaper-selling;  all 
this  time  his  chief  desire  was  to  devote  himself  to 
literature. 

It  was  with  his  first  book,  Yatikel  Boila  and  Other 
Tales  (1898),  that  he  won  recognition  from  critics 
on  both  sides  of  the  ocean.  Professor  Wiener,  of 
Harvard,  who  has  since  abandonetl  his  Yiddish 
studies,  hailed  the  author  as  the  Yiddish  Gorki. 
Successive  productions  in  fiction  {Ghetto  DjamaSy 
1904;  a  nine-hundred-page  collection  of  tales,  1910; 
the  novels,  The  lynmigrants.  Mother  and  Daughter^ 
The  Professional  Bridegroom^  The  Tenement  House ^ 
The  Rise  of  Orre)  picture  the  multiform  phases  of 
tenement  life  and  ghetto  adventure  in  the  new  land, 
with  their  exotic  milieu  and  their  peculiar  psychology. 

As  a  pioneer  in  Yiddish  literature  in  America, 


THE  YIDDISH  DRAMA  369 

Kobrin  will  always  be  remembered  as  the  dis- 
coverer of  the  tenement.  He  and  Libin  have  been 
called  by  their  associates  the  twins  of  the  tenement, 
because  of  their  preoccupation  with  the  many 
themes  furnished  by  the  East  Side  in  the  early  days. 
Kobrin  has  a  deep  sense  of  the  environmental  in- 
fluences of  the  gloomy  structures  upon  the  dwellers, 
so  that  his  numerous  tales  possess  a  historical  in- 
terest. For  a  whole  generation,  indeed,  Kobrin 
and  Libin  dominated  Yiddish  letters  on  this  side  of 
the  Atlantic.  They  both  began  with  the  sketch  and 
the  short  story,  thence  to  the  drama  and  finally 
to  the  novel.  In  Kobrin  may  be  studied  the  evolu- 
tion of  the  immigrant  psychology,  from  his  home- 
sickness for  the  "old  country"  to  the  direction  of 
that  yearning  upon  himself,  and  by  a  natural  proc- 
ess, to  the  formation  of  a  strong  nationalistic 
feeling. 

The   author's   dramas   number  some   two   dozen, 
and  he  is  still  active.    Of  these  a  surprising  number 
have  been  successful,  although  upon   the  stage  he 
seems  too  ready  to  strain  the  truth  for  a  situation. 
Without  a  doubt,  however,  Kobrin  has  had  a  whole- 
some  influence   upon    the   Yiddish    drama,   having 
followed  the  Gordin  tradition  of  personal  tenacity 
and  fought  unceasingly  for  "playwright's  rights"  as 
against    managerial    dictatorship.      His    first    play, 
Minna,  was  produced  in  1899,  having  been  written 
in    collaboration    with    Gordin.      His    second,    T/?e 
East  Side  Ghetto,  played  in  the  same  year,  brought  to 
the  attention  of  the  public  the  varied  gifts  of  Bertha 
Kalish,  who  has  since  achieved  a  reputation  among 
English  playgoers.     It  was  on   the  occasion  of  the 
production  of  Two  Sisters,  19O4,  that  Israel  Zangwill 


370        THE  DR.^MA  OF  TRANSITION 

wrote  a  very  favorable  report  oi  the  play  in  the 
New  York  Herald,  later  meeting  the  author  and 
requesting  him  to  translate  into  Yiddish  The  Chil- 
dren of  the  Ghetto.  When  that  work  was  done  and 
the  play  presented  in  Yiddish,  Zangwill  exclaimed 
enthusiastically  to  the  translator,  "Now  I  realize 
that  I  have  translated  you — not  you  me!" 

"Three  years  ago,"  said  Kobrin  to  an  interviewer 
in  191 5,  "I  organized  all  the  playwrights,  alK)ut 
twenty  in  number,  into  a  society  known  as  The 
Jewish  Playwrights'  Association.  Our  common  aim 
was  to  make  the  dramatist  independent — to  make 
it  possible  for  him  to  express  himself  freely  as  he 
feels,  and  not  as  the  manager  expects  him  to." 
A  further  insight  into  the  writer's  independence  is 
afforded  by  an  interesting  detail  in  the  history  of  his 
play,  Children  of  Nature.  (The  play,  by  the  way,  is 
founded  upon  his  early  tale,  Yankel  Boila,  and  was 
several  years  ago  produced  with  great  success  in  a 
Russian  version  at  the  Moscow  Art  Theatre.)  The 
Yiddish  original  was  accepted  in  191  2  and  rehearsals 
were  begun.  The  author  had  received  seven  hun- 
dred dollars  in  advance  royalties.  At  one  of  the 
early  rehearsals,  however,  the  manager  showed  a 
disposition  to  change  the  plot — a  phenomenon  not 
unknown  to  the  English  "boards."  Kobrin  could 
not  see  the  point,  despite  the  manager's  most  earnest 
protestations.  The  latter,  as  a  final  resort,  exclaimed 
that  unless  the  author  conceded  the  issue  he  could 
take  his  play  back.  Whereupon  the  playwright 
took  the  play  and  returned  the  advance.  Other 
managers  proving  just  as  obdurate,  Kobrin  decided 
to   produce   the   play   himself,   and   surely   enough, 


THE  YIDDISH  DRAMA  371 

when  it  was  given  at  the  Odeon  Theatre  on  the  East 
Side,  its  immediate  success  justified  the  author's 
confidence. 

Children  of  Nature  is  the  tale  of  a  village  boy  who 
falls  in  love  with  a  Gentile  lass.  The  two  have 
grown  up  together.  Yankel's  father  dies,  and  ex- 
tracts, upon  his  death-bed,  a  promise  that  his  son 
will  not  marry  out  of  the  faith;  that  instead  of  wed- 
ding Natasha  he  will  take  a  cousin,  who  happens 
to  be  a  silly  child  and  an  invalid  to  boot.  Matters 
are  further  complicated  by  the  fact  that  Natasha 
faces  motherhood.  Upon  hearing  of  Yankel's 
promise  to  his  father,  she  is  compelled  to  leave  the 
village.  Her  suffering  proves  too  much  for  Yankel; 
yet  he  is  bound  by  a  sacred  oath  and  is,  withal,  of 
an  intensely  superstitious  mental  cast.  Marry  the 
idiot  cousin  he  cannot.  On  the  day  of  the  wedding 
he  is  found  hanging,  dead,  in  the  home  of  the  pros- 
pective wife. 

Such  violent  contrasts  as  suicides  on  wedding 
days  are  dear  to  the  hearts  of  lesser  playwrights, 
yet  this  should  not  obscure  the  intellectual  honesty 
of  the  drama.  So  evident  was  this  at  the  very  first 
performance  that  the  critics  found  Kobrin  too  fair, 
so  to  speak.  The  Gentile  characters  of  the  play, 
notes  one,  are  more  amiable,  and  draw  more  deeply 
upon  the  sympathies  of  the  audience,  than  do  the 
Jewish.  A  more  serious  fault  has  been  indicated — 
one  that  strikes  at  the  roots  of  the  protagonist's 
character.  Kobrin,  in  accentuating  the  supersti- 
tious nature  of  Yankel,  makes  his  hero  weaker  as  a 
dramatic  force.  Would  so  superstititious  a  fellow 
have  dared  to  continue   to  love  out  of  the  faith? 


372        THF  DRAMA  OI-  TRANSITION 

Could  he  have  risen,  another  critic  has  asked,  to 
the  sokition  of  suicide,  if  his  beliefs  in  after-world 
punishment  were  so  strong? 

In  more  than  one  other  of  his  longer  plays  Kobrin 
deals  with  a  similar  contrast;  n(.w  it  is  between  two 
brothers,  one  of  whom  has  abiurcil  the  taith  [Back 
to  His  People),  now  between  the  real  Jewess  that  is 
Hadassah  Polaknrt",  the  singer  of  international 
repute,  and  the  "distinguished  foreigner"  that  she 
becomes  in  the  hands  of  her  press-agent  and  an 
adoring  public  [hraers  Hope).  Such  plots  arc  often, 
in  their  very  essence,  artificial,  and  l)etray  their 
fundamental  falsity  in  the  melodramatic  jerkiness  of 
the  action.  Thcv  }v)ssess  full  significance  only  to 
that  portion  of  humanity  which  has  lived  through 
the  double  life  forced  upon  the  Jew;  they  fall  short 
of  the  highest  art  because  they  strain  a  truth  which 
reality  itself  has  straineil  in  the  first  place. 

Kobrin  has  translated  Faust  and  Hamlet  for  Jewish 
readers;  he  has  also  made  Yiddish  versions  of  some 
of  the  works  of  Echcgaray,  a  writer  whose  frequent 
excursions  into  melodrama  contain  something  that 
should  appeal  to  the  less  discriminating  meml)ers  of 
the  audience-  which  everywhere  means  most  of  it. 
His  other  translations  include  the  works  of  Tur- 
geniev,  de  Maupassant,  Hugo,  Gorki.*  Kobrin's 
highest  achievement  is  not  of  the  stage;  it  is  a  short 
idyll — this,  of  all  things,  from  a  writer  deeply  sen- 
sual  and  as  capable  of  bare   literary   brutality   as 

'  It  is  Kobrin,  I  believe,  who  •  ■            ■               v 

of  Russia.  He  had  noti<efi  in  a  i<  ' 
by  a  then  unknovs-n  name.      II-- 

(Future)  a  New  York  publication   th.i-  i 

the  nearby  English  magazine?.      It  u-.i  r 

Wiener's  attention.     The  latter,  on  hi-  r- 

pose  of  collecting  material  for  his  book  i. ;<■:■.  "i  il  :,-  i  i  !'r.\t 'r"-  i;i  tiir  niintrr-nth 
century,  brought  back  with  him  the  fijsi  ihrte  volumes  of  Gorki'*  worka.  which 
were  later  put  into  En&Iish  by  Isabel  Hapgood. 


THE  YIDDISH  DRAMA  373 

any  disciple  of  Zola! — called  A  Lithuanian  Village. 
It  is  one  of  the  finest  productions  in  the  Yiddish 
tongue. 

SHOLOM  ASCH 

Asch  is  to-day  one  of  the  most  widely  read  of  the 
Yiddish  writers  and  at  the  same  time  one  of  the 
most  naturally  gifted.  His  prose,  at  its  best,  is  a 
highly  flexible  medium,  as  ready  to  the  purposes  of 
the  sternest  realism  as  to  the  softest  idyllic  effects. 
He  is  not,  in  the  rhetorical  sense  of  the  word,  a 
"stylist";  he  is  an  artist  by  virtue  of  his  spontaneous 
response  to  the  manifold  beauties  of  his  ever-chang- 
ing scene.  His  very  lapses  emphasize  the  spon- 
taneity of  his  expression  without  impairing  its 
efficacy.  By  these  tokens  he  is  not  to  be  classified 
with  the  conventional  symbols  of  genre  or  outlook; 
he  is  realist,  romanticist,  idealist,  playwright,  nov- 
elist, conteur, — all  in  one.  He  has  made  of  the 
despised  "jargon"  of  the  Haskalite  scorn  an  instru- 
ment of  beauty  whose  melodies  are  rivalled  only  by 
such  contemporaries  as  Pinski  and  Hirschbein.  Much 
of  what  he  has  written  will  perish  with  most  of  the 
other  works  of  man,  but  at  his  best  he  has  given  to 
Yiddish  literature  some  of  its  most  enduring  pages. 

He  is  to-day  in  his  forty-second  year;  his  peregri- 
nations have  carried  him  to  the  four  corners  of  the 
earth;  he  is  a  restless  mind  in  a  restless  body.  As 
early  as  his  twenty-fourth  year  he  achieved  a  rep- 
utation with  his  first  book.  The  Town^  a  series  of 
vignettes  of  provincial  Jewish  life  in  Russia,  and 
followed  up  this  success  with  a  steady  number  of 
short  tales  in  which  the  multiform  phases  of  his 
people's    life — sacred    and    secular — were    depicted 


374        TIIF.  I^RA.MA  ()!•   TRANSITION 

with  a  deep  yet  unobtrusively  poetic  insight.  Of 
his  novels,  Meri  and  77;<'  RoaJ  to  Self,  which  form  a 
continuous  whole,  depict  with  a  wealth  ot  color  and 
episode  the  wanderings  of  Jewish  souls  in  search  of 
self-realization.  The  background,  mainly  that  of 
the  Russian  revolution  of  1905,  shifts,  as  the  author 
himself  has  so  often  done,  to  various  parts  of  the 
globe.  Such  places  as  the  thirteenth  chapter  of 
Part  One  oi  Meri  and  the  forty-first  in  Part  Two  of 
The  Road  to  Self  exhibit  the  same  linguistic  irides- 
cence that  was  early  forecast  in  his  shorter  talcs. 
Mottke  the  Vagahoyui  and  Uncle  Moses^  both  now 
available  in  Knglish,  witness  the  novelist's  essential 
traits:  a  relative  carelessness  as  to  the  mere  plot  in 
itself,  while  attention  is  concentrated  u|V)n  illu- 
minating detail,  uj^on  character  in  action,  poetry  of 
scene  and  situation. 

Since,  as  Lewes  has  told  us  in  his  biography  of 
Goethe,  "the  whole  man  thinks,"  these  qualities  of 
Asch,  more  or  less  diluted,  are  to  be  found  in  his 
dramas.  Best  known  of  his  full-lcni^th  plays  is 
The  God  of  rerigeaficey  of  which  more  in  a  moment. 
The  shorter  pieces  present  a  motley  crowd  that 
troops  in  fictitious  existence  across  his  stage:  drunk- 
ards, fallen  women,  rabbis,  pious  provincial  Jews, 
sophisticated  new-worldlings,  defenders  of  the  old, 
pioneers  of  the  new.  In  these  plays,  as  in  the  longer, 
it  may  be  said  that  Asch,  generally  speaking,  is 
either  too  intent  upon  symbolism  for  its  own  sake 
or  too  easily  drawn  into  the  methods  of  melodrama. 
On  the  one  hand  his  idealism  is  apt  to  be  translated 
into  material  too  tenuous  for  effective  production; 
on  the  other,  his  equally  powerful  sense  of  the  real 
finds   expression    in    an    insistence    upon    theatrical 


THE  YIDDISH  DRAMA  375 

externals.  Yet  such  a  one-act  production  as  The 
Sinner,  which  deals  with  the  refusal  of  a  Jewish 
grave  to  receive  the  corpse  of  a  man  who  has  married 
out  of  the  fold,  is  developed  not  only  with  impartial 
outlook,  but  with  a  certain  successful  projection  of 
the  uncanny  situation.  The  effect  of  the  play  is 
that  of  a  blind  power;  one  is  conscious  of  strength 
even  where  one  is  puzzled  as  to  definite  significance. 
The  religious  may  interpret  it  as  orthodox,  the  ad- 
vanced may  see  in  it  even  a  certain  sympathy  for 
the  mysterious  figure  of  the  woman  who  has  been 
the  companion  of  his  ungodly  life;  none  can  deny 
it,  however,  a  suggestion  of  an  ineluctable  fate. 
I  have  hinted  that  such  pieces  as  Night  are  too 
tenuous  for  production,  yet  this  should  not  di- 
minish its  worth  as  a  bit  of  highly  original  and 
effective  impressionistic  writing;  the  newer  methods 
of  production,  moreover,  will  do  much  to  destroy 
former  talk  about  what  is  stageworthy  and  what  is 
not,  and  this  daring  interlude  in  which  a  prosti- 
tute's face  for  a  moment  lights  up  with  the  pallid 
holiness  of  the  Madonna's  image  may  appeal  to 
lovers  of  the  drama  that  is  imagination  as  well  as 
physical  movement. 

The  God  of  Vengeance,  upon  which  Asch's  reputa- 
tion as  a  dramatist  may  be  said  to  rest,  was  first 
produced  outside  of  its  local  habitat  by  the  famous 
Reinhardt,  at  the  Deutsches  Theater,  Berlin,  in 
1910.  The  powerful  play  quickly  made  its  way  to 
the  chief  stages  of  Europe.  It  has  been  played  all 
over  Germany,  Austria,  Russia,  Poland,  Holland, 
Norway,  Sweden,  and  Italy;  in  the  country  last 
named  it  produced  a  marked  impression  during  the 
entire  season  of  1916. 


376        THE  DRAMA  OF  TR.AXSITION 

Its  plot,  simply  narrated,  is  that  of  a  father  who, 
having  accumulated  a  modest  sum  through  the 
brothel  that  he  runs  in  his  cellar,  aspires  to  redeem 
himself  and  his  wife  in  the  eyes  oi  God  with  his 
daughter  Rifkelc.  The  money  that  sinks  its  roots 
in  impurity  shall  flourish  into  a  tree  of  sanctity. 
Yekel  presents  a  Holy  Scroll  to  the  synagogue;  he 
consorts  with  the  holy  men;  he  admonishes  his  wife 
to  keep  a  sharp  eye  upon  their  only  chilil.  Their 
vigilance  proves  of  no  avail;  Rit"kcle,  fascinated  l>y 
the  life  that  her  mother  has  led  and  that  her  father 
fosters  in  others,  is  led  astray  through  the  offices 
of  one  of  the  inmates.  With  his  hope  of  redemption 
thus  shattered,  Yekel  goes  mail  with  rage  and 
thnists  his  daughter  down  into  the  brothel  with  the 
rest  of  the  prostitutes.  Not  pleasant  stufl^  this,  nor 
very  close  to  the  life  that  most  of  us  know.  Yet 
there  is  a  certain  beauty  here — a  rugged  beauty  that 
was  born  in  no  literary  hot-house  and  much  ilimmed, 
perhaps,  by  the  repellent  human  beings  who  are  its 
carriers, — but  beauty  none  the  less. 

It  is  interesting  to  consider  Asch's  T/ie  God  of 
Vengeance  in  connection  with  a  play  like  Mrs. 
Warren  s  Profession.  To  be  sure,  there  is  no  tech- 
nical resemblance  between  the  two  dramas;  nor, 
despite  an  external  similarity  in  backgrounds,  is 
there  any  real  identity  of  purpose.  Asch's  piece 
glows  with  his  characteristic  poetic  realism  and  re- 
counts an  individual  drama  not  without  symbolic 
power.  Yet  the  essentially  moral  earnestness  of 
both  Shaw  and  Asch  brings  the  circles  of  their 
themes  in  a  sense  tangent  to  each  other.  And  I  use 
the  word  moral  in  its  broadest,  not  its  narrowest, 
sense. 


THE  YIDDISH  DRAMA  377 

Mrs.  Warren,  for  example,  cherishes  no  delusions 
about  her  dubious  profession, — neither  the  senti- 
mentality that  has  long  swathed  so  much  talk  about 
the  prostitute  nor  the  delusion  of  the  conservative, 
conventional  horror  before  an  institution  for  the 
perpetuation  of  which — in  its  uglier  phases — con- 
servatism and  conventionalism  are  much  to  blame. 
If  Yekel  and  his  wife,  in  Asch's  play,  are  not  so 
enlightened  as  Mrs.  Warren  upon  the  traffic  off 
which  they  live,  they  are  in  their  own  crude  way 
equally  sincere  in  considering  it  a  business  quite  as 
legitimate  as  any  other.  With  the  same  incon- 
sistency that  Hindel  displays  in  imploring  heaven 
for  aid  in  achieving  her  nefarious  aims,  after  which 
she  promises  to  be  a  model  wife  and  mother,  Mrs. 
Warren,  at  the  end  of  Shaw's  play,  swears  by  heaven 
that  henceforth  she  will  lead  a  life  of  evil. 

In  the  case  of  Yekel  and  his  wife,  and  In  Mrs. 
Warren's,  another  touch  of  inconsistency  is  added 
by  the  agreement  that  theirs  is  not  the  best  of  pro- 
fessions. Crofts,  too,  in  the  English  play,  discusses 
the  business  with  all  the  matter-of-factness  of  Asch's 
pimp,  Shloyme,  yet  considers  himself  a  gentleman 
none  the  less. 

Rifkele,  the  seduced  daughter,  is  no  Vivie.  Asch's 
simple-minded  Jewish  girl  is  a  victim,  not  a  rebel. 
Yet  in  either  case  the  daughter  is  lost  to  the  parents, 
and  the  power  of  money  cannot  win  back  the  child. 
And  just  as  Yekel,  in  his  impotence,  blasphemously 
thrusts  the  Holy  Scroll  from  his  household,  so  does 
Mrs.  Warren,  defeated  in  her  attempt  to  regain  her 
daughter,  cry,  "From  this  time  forth,  so  help  me 
heaven  in  my  last  hour,  I'll  do  wrong,  and  nothing 
but  wrong.     And  I'll  prosper  on  it."     Perhaps,  too. 


378        THE  DRAMA  OF  TRANSITION 

the  retribution  which  in  each  case  is  visited  upon 
the  parent  arises  from  the  fact  that  both  Mrs. 
Warren  and  Yekel  have,  in  Vivie's  accusatory, 
Ibsen-like  words,  "lived  one  life  and  believed  in 
another." 

The  God  of  Vengeance^  despite  conclusions  too 
easily  drawn,  is  not  a  sex  play;  I  mention  this,  not 
because  I  believe  any  odium  attaches  to  sex  in 
literature,  but  out  of  a  desire  to  make  a  distinction 
between  values.  When  Asch  wishes  to  deal  with 
sex  he  is  not  afraid  to  handle  the  subject  with  all 
the  poetry  and  power  at  his  command.  Such  a  play 
as  his  Jephthah's  Daughter  treats  the  elemental  urge 
of  sex  with  daring,  beauty,  and  Dionysiac  abandon, 
while  a  golden  symbolism  wafts  through  the  piece. 
Again,  in  his  novel  Mottke  the  Vagabond^  he  has 
given  us  scenes  from  the  underworld  of  Warsaw 
that  are  hard  to  parallel  for  truth  to  detail.  The 
God  of  Vengeance  is  no  mere  brothel-drama,  but  is 
instinct  with  a  connotation  of  genuine  artistic 
beauty  and  ethical  verity.  Nor  is  it  a  drama  with 
a  moral  purpose  (employing  the  word  now  in  its 
narrow  sense),  as  Mr.  Alencken  interpreted  it  in 
one  of  the  few  intelligent  criticisms  that  greeted  its 
appearance  in  English.' 

When  he  came  to  the  United  States  some  seven 
years  ago,  he  expressed,  in  an  interview,  a  desire 
to  eliminate  from  the  Jewish  theatre  the  commer- 
cial atmosphere  that  was  its  bane.  "One  way  to 
do  this,"  he  suggested,  "is  to  introduce  into  the 
representations  of  our  modern  life,  and  ultimately 

'  Mr.  Mencken  was  the  first,  among  English  critics,  to  recognize  Asch's  gifts 
as  a  novelist.  His  critique  of  this  play  as  a  moralistic  tract  may  be  traced  to  the 
intensely  religious  atmosphere  upon  which  much  of  the  force  of  the  issue  depends. 
Asch  is  an  independent  mind,  least  likely  of  all  his  confreres  to  preach  morality 
either  upon  the  stage  or  upon  the  printed  page.  He  is,  as  his  symbolic  pieces  show, 
eager  to  reveal  beauty,  but  never  to  debase  his  medium. 


THE  YIDDISH  DRAMA  379 

into  the  life  itself,  our  beautiful  Hebrew  traditions. 
A  great  many  of  them  are  pagan — I  confess — but 
beautiful  nevertheless,  and  contributory  to  a  fine 
culture."  That  phrase,  "pagan — I  confess — but 
beautiful  nevertheless,"  is  an  excellent  commentary 
upon  this  artist  when  he  is  at  his  best.  None  of 
his  plays,  however,  has  had  such  an  influence  upon 
the  Jewish  drama,  which  for  the  most  part  plods 
along  the  road  of  mediocrity,  quite  impervious  to 
the  labors  of  the  better  spirits.  The  plain  truth  is 
that  in  the  United  States  most  cultured  Jews  seek 
the  Gentile  drama,  and  the  average  audience  for 
the  Yiddish  product  is — average. 

DAVID  PINSKI 

Mr.  Pinski  stands  well  in  the  forefront  of  his 
people's  prose  artists  and  dramatists.  Hostile  tac- 
tics of  the  East  Side  press  and  the  cliques  that 
control  it  long  kept  his  name  from  achieving  the 
fame  that  was  its  due,  yet  there  is  in  his  work  a 
somicthing  finer  that  limits  his  appeal  to  a  small 
circle — an  aristocracy  of  attitude  that  is  the  full 
flower  rather  than  the  inconsistent  antithesis  of  his 
democratic,  universal  aspirations.  Something  of 
this  there  is  in  the  writings  of  Perez,  who  was,  with 
his  characteristic  perspicacity,  the  first  to  discern 
the  natural  gifts  in  the  young  man. 

To  the  literature  of  the  Jews  Pinski  is  known,  not 
only  as  dramatist,  but  as  the  discoverer  of  the 
Jewish  proletariat  in  fiction.  Yet,  paradoxically 
enough,  the  very  people  whom  he  so  discovered  has 
yet  really  to  discover  him,  and  while  third-  and 
fourth-rate  dramas  weigh  down  the  boards  of  the 


380        THE  DRAMA  OF  TRANSITION 

Yiddish  theatre,  it  is  left  for  Europe,  and  latterly, 
non-Jewish  America,  to  appreciate  at  their  proper 
value  dramas  which  have,  in  some  cases,  been  before 
the  Yiddish  public  for  years.  This  is  all  the  less 
excusable  on  the  part  of  Yiddish  critics,  in  that 
Pinski  has  been  a  resident  of  New  York  since  1899, 
and  has,  with  the  exception  of  Isaac  Shcftel^  written 
his  best  works  in  that  city.  Yet  in  all  the  years  he 
has  lived  in  New  York  he  has  not  secured  a  regular 
Yiddish  publisher.  It  would  seem,  once  more,  that 
a  dramatic  prophet  is  not  without  honor  save  in 
his  own  land.  This,  however,  should  not  give  the 
impression  that  Pinski  is  unknown  to  the  Jewish 
reader.  Far  from  it.  His  stories  are  widely  read  by 
an  ever-increasing  number,  both  for  their  intimate 
and  artistic  pictures  of  working-class  life  in  Europe 
and  their  skillful,  melodious  use  of  the  Yiddish 
tongue,  which  we  shall  later  see  has  been  moulded 
by  the  author  into  a  thing  of  beauty  that  at  its 
best  rivals  the  harmonious  language  of  a  Yeats,  a 
Maeterlinck,  or  a  Lord  Dunsany.  His  plays,  too, 
are  known  among  the  more  discerning.  But  it  has 
been  left,  after  all,  for  America  really  to  discover 
David  Pinski. 

Born  on  April  5,  1872,  in  the  government  of 
Mohilev,  Russia,  of  pious  parents,  he  was  early  des- 
tined for  the  career  of  rabbi.  At  the  age  of  seven 
he  began  the  study  of  the  Talmud,  and  in  a  few 
years  became  widely  known  as  a  learned  Talmudist. 
At  the  age  of  ten  he  rebelled  against  the  narrow  in- 
tensity of  his  training  and  first  felt  his  inspiration  to 
become  a  writer.  This  ambition  had  its  initial  glow- 
ing success  the  next  year  when,  in  his  grandmother's 
home,  before  an  audience  of  some  twenty  persons 


THE  YIDDISH  DRAMA  381 

who  had  paid  admission,  there  was  given  a  piece 
which  he  himself  cannot  at  present  recall  except 
that  it  brought  much  laughter  and  tears  to  the  eyes 
of  the  spectators — a  recipe  that  still  holds  good  for 
success  on  the  stages  of  more  than  one  country. 
This  was  his  only  attempt  at  drama  until  1899,  the 
year  of  his  one-act  Yisurim  {Agonies)  and  the  three- 
act  Isaac  Sheftel. 

When  he  reached  the  age  of  thirteen  his  family 
moved  to  Moscow,  where  his  secular  education  be- 
gan, but  this  was  soon  put  a  stop  to  by  restrictions 
against  the  Jews.  The  year  1892  finds  him  in  Vi- 
enna, this  time  preparing  for  the  medical  profession, 
but  the  expulsion  of  his  parents  from  Moscow  brought 
him  back  to  Russia,  where,  in  Warsaw — the  Mecca 
of  Jewish  literary  talent — he  took  to  writing  the 
stories  that  soon  made  him  known.  At  first  he 
wrote  in  Hebrew  and  in  Russian,  but  as  early  as  his 
seventeenth  year  he  saw  that  if  he  was  to  help  his 
people,  he  must  use  their  tongue,  and  he  gave  him- 
self definitely  over  to  Yiddish.  In  1893  with  the 
story,  The  New  Madman  (known  now  as  In  a  Mad- 
house) y  he  made  his  successful  debut  as  author.  Not 
long  after,  together  with  Isaac  Loeb  Perez  he 
founded  the  so-called  Holiday  Pages,  a  publica- 
tion which  owed  its  name  and  its  method  of  pub- 
lication to  a  peculiar  Russian  law  against  regular 
periodicals  in  Yiddish.  To  get  around  the  censor, 
the  enterprising  partners  took  advantage  of  the 
fact  that  Jewish  holidays  came  with  comfortable 
frequency.  Perez  was  the  guiding  spirit  of  the 
publication,  while  Pinski  was  its  organizing  power; 
here  again  his  modesty  kept  him  from  having  his 
name  appear  upon   the  editorial  page,  so  that  his 


382        THE  DRAMA  OF  TRANSITION 

association  with  Perez  is  little  known.  The  year 
1896  found  Pinski  in  Berlin,  where  he  made  a  study 
of  German  literature  and  philosophy  and  established 
friendships  with  the  leading  literary  and  dramatic 
spirits  of  the  country.  Here,  too,  he  conceived  his 
first  important  drama,  Isaac  Sheftel^  under  the 
influence  of  the  Naturalists.  By  this  time  his 
name  had  begun  to  be  known  among  the  Jews  of 
New  York,  and  he  was  offered  a  place  upon  the 
editorial  staff  of  a  weekly  there.  He  was  prompted 
to  accept  by  the  fact  that  New  York  had  an  es- 
tablished Yiddish  theatre,  and  that  his  play  might 
be  produced.  Judge  of  his  surprise  when  he  learned 
upon  arriving  that  the  Yiddish  managers  would  not 
even  consent  to  read  his  play,  because — it  was 
written  in  three  acts,  and  they  demanded  four. 
From  that  day  to  this  Pinski  has  gone  his  own  way, 
and  it  is  significant  that  more  than  one  of  the  plavs 
that  soon  followed  was  written  in  three  acts,  and 
even  one. 

Once,  in  1903,  Pinski  was  even  upon  the  verge  of 
giving  up  his  literary  career.  He  entered  Columbia 
College,  prepared  to  receive  the  Ph.D.  degree  after 
a  year's  study  and  to  teach  German  literature  and 
drama.  But  his  natural  gifts  proved  too  strong  for 
him.  On  May  20,  1904,  when  he  was  supposed  to 
go  to  the  doctor's  examination,  he  sat  down  and 
instead  put  the  finishing  touches  to  The  Zwie 
Family — about  which  for  many  months  there  raged 
a  discussion  that  has  not  yet  quite  subsided.  Only 
two  years  later  he  was  to  write  The  Treasure.  From 
that  day  to  this  he  has  been  steadily  engaged  upon 
his  literary  work,  singularly  unmindful  of  all  in- 
fluences   not   directly   concerned    with    the    highest 


THE  YIDDISH  DRAMA  383 

that  there  is  in  him.  "My  work  has  become,"  he 
said  to  me  some  years  ago  in  his  Bronx  home, 
"almost  a  personal  rite.  I  have  forgotten  what  the 
voice  of  the  critics  sounds  like.  And  as  for  my  life 
itself,  it  is,  and  has  been,  very  uneventful.  Its 
greatest  joy  has  always  been  my  wife.  Its  greatest 
sorrow,  the  loss  of  my  seven-year-old  son  in  the 
recent  epidemic  of  infantile  paralysis." 

Pinski's  first  significant  play,  written  at  the  age 
of  twenty-seven,  is  a  natural  development  from  his 
early  tales.  It  is  not,  however,  as  might  have  been 
feared,  both  from  the  age  at  which  he  wrote  it  and 
the  tales  from  which  it  evolved,  spoiled  by  any 
propagandistic  aims;  indeed,  it  is  a  psychological 
study  rather  than  a  plea  for  a  class.  More,  despite 
its  Jewish  background  and  its  poverty-stricken 
milieu,  its  leading  character,  the  factory-worker, 
Isaac  Sheftel,  is  a  symbol  who  rises  above  class  or 
race  into  the  universal.  Sheftel's  tragedy  is  the 
tragedy  of  us  all — the  tragedy  not  only  of  the  un- 
fulfilled, but  of  the  unfulfillable.  This  worker, 
whose  vision  sees  so  much  farther  than  his  meagre 
mental  equipment  can  carry  him,  has  invented  one 
or  two  simple  machines,  and  has  sold  them  for  a 
mere  pittance  to  his  employer.  Suddenly  he  is 
seized  with  a  new  idea  that  promises  a  masterpiece 
of  invention;  he  cannot  sleep,  he  cannot  eat;  he 
even  takes  off  three  days  from  the  shop,  despite 
his  dire  poverty,  so  that  he  may  finish  the  work. 
His  wife  nags  him  for  his  selfishness;  his  neighbors 
ridicule  him;  his  employer  sends  to  inform  him  that 
if  he  does  not  return  to  work  that  very  day,  his  place 
will  be  filled  by  another.  In  stubborn  silence 
Sheftel  works  away  at  his  contrivance,  baffled  and 


384        THE  DRAMA  OF  TRANSITION 

beaten.  His  inborn  creative  intelligence  is  balked 
by  his  mental  and  technical  limitations,  and  fairly 
crazed  by  his  wife's  unceasing  nagging  and  the 
wretched  surroundings  of  his  cellar  home,  he  smashes 
the  entire  device  and  returns  to  work  without 
having  eaten  a  bite.  His  shopmates  receive  him 
with  taunts,  and  soon  begin  to  ply  him  with  liquor 
to  revive  his  sunken  spirits.  In  this  condition  he 
answers  his  employer's  recriminations  by  smashing 
the  machines  which  had  been  previously  bought 
from  him.  He  rushes  forth  from  the  factory,  evades 
pursuit,  and  for  the  rest  of  the  day  wanders  madly 
through  the  woods.  That  night  he  returns  to  his 
home,  exhausted;  the  better  part  of  him,  his  beloved 
inventions,  is  already  destroyed;  no  one  under- 
stands him;  he  cannot  express  his  own  visions. 
Thus  dejected,  and  half  unwittingly,  he  commits 
suicide  by  drinking  rat  poison.  Even  his  death  is 
ignominious. 

The  playwright  has  been  commended  tor  his 
handling  of  crowds  upon  the  stage.  Here,  in  his 
first  large  effort,  is  afforded  an  excellent  instance  of 
this  particular  skill.  The  second  act,  which  shows 
the  interior  of  the  factory,  is  admirable  not  only  for 
its  group-technique;  the  whole  life  of  the  worker — 
his  ready  humor,  his  inappreciation  of  his  position, 
his  incapacity  to  understand  the  Sheftel  type,  is 
drawn  in  rapid,  vivid  strokes  that  forecast  the 
notable  fourth  act  of  The  Treasure. 

From  the  man  Sheftel,  Pinski,  in  The  Zwie  Fam'th^ 
(1904),  went  to  the  race.  Here  are  represented, 
under  one  roof,  three  generations  of  the  Zwie  family 
— not  as  in  Milestones^  for  instance,  by  means  of 

'  In  the  English  version  this  is  called  The  Last  Jew. 


THE  YIDDISH  DRAMA  385 

acts  with  the  years  between  them,  but  all  simul- 
taneously gathered  in  one  home,  and  symbolic  of 
the  three  generations  of  present-day  Jews.  Old 
Reb  Maishe,  the  city  preacher,  is  the  type  of  re- 
ligious idealist  that  is  fast  disappearing;  his  son 
Yankel  mouths  the  words  of  God,  to  be  sure,  but 
his  mind  is  upon  the  accumulation  of  money.  Yan- 
kel's  sons,  on  the  other  hand,  flame  with  an  idealism 
no  less  than  that  of  their  grandfather;  but  it  is  an 
idealism  that  looks  away  from  the  old  city  preacher's 
goal.  The  one  is  a  Zionist,  the  other  a  Socialist, 
the  third  believes  in  assimilation.  And  so,  under 
one  roof,  five  worlds.  Suddenly  occurs  a  massacre, 
and  each  world  reacts  in  its  own  peculiar  way  to 
the  stress  of  the  horrible  day.  The  old  grandfather, 
intent  upon  saving  the  holy  scroll  of  the  synagogue 
from  desecration,  wanders  through  the  city  in  vain 
to  find  defenders.  His  own  family  deserts  him,  each 
going  his  own  way.  The  leaders  of  the  community, 
more  intent  upon  business  than  religion,  likewise 
turn  a  deaf  ear  to  his  entreaties.  Baffled,  old  Zwie 
makes  his  way,  alone,  to  the  synagogue,  where  he 
is  soon  to  die  by  a  stone  hurled  through  the  window. 
Too  late  comes  aid  from  his  grandsons;  he  is  dead, 
and  the  old  order  with  him.  But  a  new  one  shall 
arise,  and  the  torch-bearer  will  come  from  the  third 
generation. 

Obviously  such  a  play  (erroneously  interpreted 
by  a  leading  Russian-Jewish  critic  as  a  mere  pogrom- 
drama)  can  have  its  chief  interest  only  for  the  race 
whose  trials  it  symbolizes.  It  represents  perhaps  the 
author's  most  intense  outpouring  upon  the  question 
of  his  people;  the  tragic  figure  of  the  protagonist  is 
a  second  Moses,  as  it  were,  whose  following  aban- 


386        THE  DRAMA  OF  TRANSITION 

dons  him  at  the  crucial  moment.  The  intense 
pessimism  of  the  early  scenes  gives  way,  at  the  very 
end,  to  a  ray  of  hope. 

Follo'wing  closely  upon  this  play,  in  the  same  year, 
came  the  one-act  Gluecksvergesseue,  known  in  Eng- 
lish as  Forgotten  Souls.  Here,  as  in  the  majority  of 
Pinski's  works,  the  Jewish  background  does  not 
tend  in  the  slightest  to  smother  the  universal  note 
which  must  sound  beneath  all  work  that  is  truly 
great.  Rarely  has  the  pathos  of  self-sacrifice  re- 
ceived treatment  at  once  so  simple,  so  ironic,  so 
tenderly  human.  Fanny's  sclt-cffacement  so  that 
her  sister  may  be  happy  is  a  trait  that  makes  her 
kin  with  all  who  have  suffered  for  another's  joy. 
The  jubilant  opening  of  the  act  and  its  steady  pro- 
gression to  the  passionate,  pathetic  close,  is  accom- 
plished with  a  crescendo  that  is  one  of  the  author's 
distinctive  technical  traits.  It  was  already  evident 
in  the  second  act  o{  Isaac  Sheftel;  it  forms  one  of  the 
chief  charms  of  Pinski's  highly  original  war  piece, 
Little  Heroes^  one  of  the  miniature  masterpieces  that 
grew  out  of  the  savage  conflict. 

The  year  T906  marks  a  distinct  step  forward  in 
the  playwright's  career.  It  is  the  year  of  The 
Eternal  Jew,  of  T/ie  Treasure^  and  of  Jaco/f  the 
Blacksmith.  From  the  crushing  sense  of  life's 
sterner  realities  he  had  by  this  time  distilled  a  vision, 
a  sense  of  color  and  movement  which,  added  to  the 
intense  power  of  his  earlier  style,  soon  resulted  in  a 
series  of  plays  which  for  sheer  inner  beauty,  chastity 
of  art,  and  pregnancy  of  imagination,  will  long  re- 
main unsurpassed,  even  as  they  are  now  unap- 
proached,  in  the  history  of  Jewish  drama.  To- 
gether with  all  this  came  a  new  rhythmic  prose  that 


THE  YIDDISH  DRAMA  387 

lends  itself  most  naturally  to  the  expression  of 
Jewish  thought.  Pinski  has  made  of  the  long- 
despised  "jargon"  a  thing  of  flexible  beauty,  of 
infinite  tenderness  or  crushing  power,  a  stream  of 
melody  that  only  rarely  is  disturbed  by  an  occa- 
sional construction  that  is  too  German  for  the 
idiom.  Without  the  suggestion  of  preciosity,  he 
chooses  even  his  vowels  with  a  poet's  ear,  and  his 
later  plays  demand  to  be  read  aloud,  if  even  to  one's 
self,  for  their  fullest  efi^ect. 

The  Eternal  Jew,  besides  being  the  first  of  a  series 
of  plays  founded  upon  the  Messianic  idea,  is  also 
the  first  of  a  tetralogy,  each  act  complete  in  itself, 
based  upon  the  fascinating  subject  that  has  inspired 
so  many  writers  before  him.  Here,  for  the  first 
time,  appears  the  sense  of  the  color  and  glamor  of 
history  which  is  to  come  to  full  fruition  five  years 
later  in  The  Dumb  Messiah.  Here,  too,  makes  its 
initial  appearance  another  characteristic,  later  to 
receive  greater  exemplification  in  such  a  piece  as 
Mary  Magdalene,  or  the  beautiful  series  of  one-act 
plays,  five  in  all,  written  around  the  wives  of  King 
David,  and  thus  constituting,  as  it  were  a  Biblical 
Anatol.  Pinski,  in  drawing  upon  the  Bible  or  upon 
Talmudic  legend  for  inspiration,  uses  his  source 
merely  as  a  suggestion.  He  seizes  upon  his  per- 
sonages, studies  them,  penetrates  their  inner  life, 
and  evolves  the  details  of  the  action  in  strict  con- 
sistency with  the  character  of  the  actors;  his  plays 
not  only  fill  out  the  mere  suggestions  of  his  source, 
but  interpret  them  as  well.  This  is  well  shown  in 
The  Eternal  Jew,  where  the  author  has  quoted  his 
source  in   the  original  Hebrew,   translated   it  into 


388        THE  DRAMA  OF  TRANSITION 

Yiddish,  and  embodied  it  in  a  dramatic  form  that 
glorifies  the  dull  iteration  of  the  original. 

Perhaps  it  is  more  than  mere  coincidence  that 
two  of  the  leading  plays  produced  by  the  Yiddish 
theatre  are  on  the  subject  of  money.  Gordin's 
God,  Man,  and  Devil  is  a  thesis-play,  like  many 
others  that  Gordin  wrote,  differing  from  them,  how- 
ever, in  the  success  which  attended  the  author  in 
his  remaking  of  Goethe's  Faust  into  an  original 
drama  of  undeniable  potency.  But  Gordin,  a  born 
man  of  the  theatre,  lacked  the  refinements  of  higher 
art.  He  did  not  possess  the  keen  j'>sychological  in- 
sight which  is  one  of  Pinski's  chief  gifts  as  dram- 
atist; so  that  in  many  respects  the  difference  be- 
tween God,  Man,  and  Devil  and  The  Treasure  rep- 
resents the  great  stride  taken  by  Jewish  drama  in 
the  few  years  that  sejvirated  the  writing  of  the  two 
plays.  The  earlier  one  is  the  acme  of  Gordin's 
theatrical  talents;  together  with  his  Mirele  Efros 
it  represents  the  high-water  mark  of  the  third  dis- 
tinct epoch  in  the  evolution  of  the  Yiddish  drama. 
An  intense  action,  determining,  rather  than  deter- 
mined by,  the  characters;  a  ready  flow  of  speech;  a 
certain  brutal  strength;  an  obvious  thesis  worked 
out  with  suspense,  crisis,  and  ultimate  catastrophe. 

In  Pinski's  The  Treasure  (produced  in  1 910  at  the 
Deutsches  Theater,  Berlin,  by  Max  Reinhardt)  one 
notices  immediately  the  touch  of  a  master  hand. 
No  longer  do  the  personages  make  the  ready  slaves 
of  the  dramatist;  they  are  the  germ  of  the  action, 
which  rises  most  naturally  from  their  own  natures. 
Tille,  despite  the  fact  that  her  father  is  a  grave- 
digger,  and  that  the  cemetery  is  a  daily  reminder  of 
the  vanity  of  earthly  pomp  and  possession,  yearns 
for  the  power  that  beauty  and  wealth  may  wield. 


THE  YIDDISH  DRAMA  389 

Not  even  the  Ninth  of  Ab,  one  of  the  most  solemn 
days  in  the  holy  calendar,  can  take  her  mind  from 
the  contemplation  of  handsome  young  men  and 
brilliant  matches.  And  what  if  the  handsome 
young  men  don't  look  her  way,  and  the  brilliant 
matches  do  not  appear?  Can  she  not  imagine  them? 
Is  she  not,  at  least,  queen  of  that  realm  ?  And  what 
shall  prevent  her  from  imagining,  for  instance, 
that  she  is  Rothschild's  bride?  In  the  midst  of 
such  a  mood  in  comes  her  half-witted  brother  Yudke, 
who  has  just  buried  his  dog  and  has  found  in  the 
earth  thus  dug  up  a  handful  of  shining  gold  pieces. 
Seized  by  one  of  his  numerous  whims,  he  places  them 
all  in  Tille's  hands.  Following,  as  they  do,  fast 
upon  her  golden  visions,  what  more  natural  than 
that  she  should  seize  upon  her  father's  suggestion 
that  probably  there  is  a  treasure  buried  where 
Yudke  has  interred  his  dog?  She  refuses  to  sur- 
render the  gold  pieces  to  her  parents,  jumps  merrily 
out  of  the  house,  and,  regardless  of  the  sacred  char- 
acter of  the  day,  runs  off  to  the  city  to  deck  herself 
out  in  the  finest  that  the  department  stores  can 
provide. 

She  returns  late  that  evening,  in  a  carriage,  if 
you  please,  leaving  behind  her  a  trail  of  open- 
mouthed  citizens.  For  she  has  not  bothered  with 
details;  since,  doubtless,  an  enormous  treasure  was 
buried  near  Yudke's  dog,  and  since  he  would  surely 
recall  just  where  he  had  interred  his  pet,  as  soon  as 
the  forgetfulness  which  always  followed  his  epileptic 
attacks  would  pass  over,  she  has  spread  the  report 
that  her  folks  had  upon  their  hands  a  great  fortune 
in  gold  pieces,  yielded  out  of  the  bowels  of  the 
graveyard. 

At  once  the  entire  community  comes  fawning  at 


390        THE  DRAMA  OF  TRANSITION 

her  heels.  The  leading  matchmaker  calls  to  arrange 
a  splendid  union,  the  humble  grave-digger  begins  to 
receive  more  visitors  in  a  single  day  than  had  ever 
before  graced  his  dwelling  in  his  entire  life.  All 
manner  of  complications  begin  to  arise,  prompted 
by  the  jealousy  and  covetousness  of  his  neighbors, 
until  it  is  impossible  to  manage  the  pretense  any 
longer.  But  now  that  the  finding  of  the  treasure  is 
denied,  who  will  believe  the  denial?  And  when 
Tille's  poor  father  tells  the  tale  exactly  as  it  stands: 
that  his  son  found  a  few  gold  pieces  where  he  buried 
a  dog,  and  that  he  cannot  now  recall  where  the 
place  was,  the  report  spreads  like  wildfire,  and  the 
excited  community,  believing  that  there  is  a  fortune 
where  the  dog  lies  buried,  begins  to  ransack  the 
cemetery  and  dig  it  up  from  top  to  bottom  in  the 
search  for  the  gold.  The  whole  town  turns  out;  in  the 
anxious  search,  graves  are  desecrated.  And  when 
finally  Yudke  remembers  where  he  buried  his  dog 
(in  the  grave  of  a  holy  man!),  it  turns  out  that  there 
is  no  treasure  at  all,  and  the  crowd  disperses.  It  is 
the  dead  of  night,  and  the  souls  of  the  departed, 
literally  awakened  by  the  search  for  the  treasure, 
discuss  the  eventful  day  in  mystic  epilogue  to  the 
"bitter  comedy."  .  .  .  "Money,  money,  money," 
sound  the  mysterious  voices  of  the  shades.  "And 
yet  it  must  lead  to  something.  Surely  there  must 
be  a  goal.  .  .  .  Only  God  knows  that.  .  .  . 
And  man  must  learn  what  it  is.  That  will  be  his 
greatest  victory.     Man's  greatest  victory." 

Several  OF  THE  Dead:     Man's.     .     .     . 
Others:     The   living  one's.      .      .      .      And   we?      {A 
ghostly  breathing  of  laughter  and  sighing.) 

The  First:     Man's  greatest  victory.     .     .     . 


THE  YIDDISH  DRAMA  391 

And  the  curtain  descends  upon  the  enigma.^ 

It  is  no  small  tribute  to  the  author  that  the  play- 
rises  most  naturally  into  the  mystic  close.  Money, 
the  dead  seem  to  whisper  to  us,  and  the  possessions 
which  it  represents,  have  thus  far  mastered  hu- 
manity; but  some  day  humanity  will  master  it. 
The  meanness  in  man  that  pursuit  of  wealth  has 
called  forth  will  then  vanish  in  the  proper  appraisal 
of  that  wealth  as  a  means,  not  as  an  end;  money 
may  be,  until  that  day,  at  the  root  of  all  evil,  but 
the  struggle  after  money  is  not  a  search  for  evil;  the 
evil  is  incident  to  the  search.  And  man's  greatest 
victory  will  be  the  mastery  of  his  possessions. 

The  opening  act  is  an  admirable  example  of  ex- 
pository art;  the  second  and  third  acts,  in  the  humor 
and  satire  that  spring  spontaneously  from  the  germ 
of  the  action,  reach  a  level  rarely  attained  in  Amer- 
ican or  continental  drama.  Professor  Baker  has 
already  signaled  out  the  closing  act  as  being  re- 
markable for  its  handling  of  the  crowd  in  the  cem- 
etery. The  entire  play,  so  significant  in  its  literal 
action,  rises  to  universality  in  the  unobtrusive,  yet 
inescapable  symbolism  of  its  inner  development. 
Symbolism  is  almost  as  natural  as  speech  to  the 

'  Since  it  was  Ludwig  Lewisohn's  English  version  of  The  Treasure  that  brought 
Pinski  to  the  Gentile  reader  of  this  country,  and  thus  elicited  from  Professor 
G.  P.  Baker,  of  Harvard,  a  fulsome  measure  of  praise  that  further  established 
the  Yiddish  dramatist  in  the  favor  of  a  discriminating  few,  I  give  here  a  short 
article  written  by  Baker  for  the  Boston  Evening  Transcript  of  March  31,  1917, 
to  companion  the  discussion  of  Pinski  written  by  me  for  the  same  issue.  The 
present  section  on  Pinski  is  a  revision  of  that  discussion.     Said  Professor  Baker: 

"When  The  Treasure  came  from  the  publisher,  the  name  of  its  author,  David 
Pinski,  meant  nothing  to  me.  I  opened  the  book,  thinking  wearily,  'One  more 
play  to  read,'  but  I  read  it  with  such  growing  enthusiasm  that  I  have  come  back 
to  it  again  and  again.  The  Treasure  is  a  comedy — or  is  it  a  tragedy?  In  any  case 
it  rests  on  intimate  knowledge  of  life  among  the  poor  Jews  in  a  Slavic  city.  The 
observer  is  sympathetic,  yet  not  limited  in  his  judgments  by  their  prejudices  and 
conventions.  It  is  a  play  which  oddly  combines  intense  realism  of  details  with 
broad,  imaginative  sweep.  Though  there  is  an  admitted  general  dramatic  prin- 
ciple that  to  mingle  the  realism  of  every  day  with  the  supernatural  is  dangerous 
except  in  the  hands  of  a  master,  so  perfectly  does  Mr.  Pinski  use  the  two  in  The 
Treasure  that  I  more  than  suspect  he  is  a  master. 

"When  1  look  about  in  English  literature  for  a  parallel  to  this  play,  I  think  of 


392        THE  DRAMA  OF  TRANSITION 

Jew,  yet  too  often  trammeled  by  an  overinsistence 
upon  detail  that  ends  by  becoming  too  monotonously 
obvious  or,  on  the  other  hand,  involved  and  even 
far-fetched.  Thus  Sholom  Asch's  Jephthahi  Daugh- 
ter falls  into  the  first  category,  while  more  than 
one  piece  by  Perez  Hirschbein  inclines  to  the  other 
extreme.  Pinski  was  saved  from  this  in  The  Treasure 
and  other  pieces  by  his  thorough  immersion  in 
the  theme  and  his  freedom  from  the  trammels  of 
conventionalism.  More  than  one  will  object  that 
there  is  a  mite  too  much  of  talk  in  the  play,  as, 
indeed  in  the  drama  built  around  the  Zwie  family; 
the  criticism  applies  more  to  the  latter  than  to 
The  Treasure^  however.  In  the  Zwie  play  the 
protagonist's  exhortations  are  largely  repetitions 
and  delay  the  action  not  merely  in  the  conventional, 
technical  sense,  but  in  the  deeper  and  more  legitimate 
sense  of  emotional  unfolding. 

Jacob  the  Blacksmith  is  hardly  worthy  of  the  two 
pieces  that  preceded  it  in  the  same  year.  It  pos- 
sesses too  many  of  the  qualities  that  insure  rapid 
success  upon  the  Yiddish  stage — a  success  which  it 
has  had  and  still  continues  to  enjoy.  It  looks  like 
a  "pot-boiler" — revealing,  no  doubt,  the  hand  that 

Ben  Jonson's  Volpone.  There  is  in  both  plays  something  of  the  same  mocking 
laughter,  the  same  bitter  recognition  of  the  humor  there  may  be  in  aordidnesa 
and  horror.  Both  are  largely  and  finely  conceived.  If  The  Treasure  lacks  the  poetic 
expression  of  Volpone,  it  has  finer  truth  of  characterization. 

"This  grim  comedy  of  the  effect  upon  a  community  of  some  money,  found  in 
the  Jewish  Cemetery  by  the  demented  Yudke.  is  certainly  one  of  the  most  remark- 
able plays  written  in  the  past  ten  years.  Successful  on  the  Yiddish  stage  of  New 
York,  produced  by  Reinhardt  in  his  Deutsches  Theater  in  Berlin,  l)ecaii9e  he  rec- 
ognized its  more  than  local  significance,  it  has  not  been  seen  on  our  stage  even  a 
year  after  its  appearance  in  an  admirable  English  translation.  It  is  easy  to  see 
why  amateurs  should  hesitate  to  stage  it,  for  it  requires  a  large  cast  and  very  care- 
ful producing.  Its  difficulties,  however,  are  of  the  sort  to  stimulate  a  produrer  of 
the  best  type  to  his  utmost  endeavor.  Sympathetically  and  thoughtfully  staged. 
it  would  certainly  produce  a  strong  impression.  Produced  according  to  formula, 
as  are  so  many  of  our  plays  on  the  New  York  stage,  it  would  be  so  twisted  and 
contorted  as  to  lose  most  of  its  chief  values.  Is  it  not  a  great  pity  that  our  present 
conditions  do  not  even  permit  our  public  to  judge  for  themselves  a  play  as  thought- 
ful, as  free  from  conventionality,  yet  as  essentially  dramatic  and  as  individual 
as  The  Treasure?"     The  play  was  later  produced  by  the  Tbeaue  Guild. 


THE  YIDDISH  DRAMA  393 

wrote  it,  but  none  the  less  reflecting  little  credit 
upon  the  author.  Its  main  theme,  that  of  a  way- 
ward husband  regenerated  by  the  confidence  of  his 
wife,  is  important  to  us  mainly  as  indicating  the 
entrance  of  the  dramatist  into  the  field  of  the  drama 
based  upon  sex-problems.  The  characterization  is 
not  clear,  and  despite  the  strong  act  in  the  black- 
smith's shop,  it  is  one  of  the  least  convincing  of  the 
writer's  published  works. 

With  the  poetic  Gabri  and  the  Women ,  however, 
written  two  years  later,  Pinski  is  more  successful. 
The  drama  is  not  particularly  Jewish  in  tone  (and 
after  all,  even  for  Jewish  dramatists,  the  essential 
thing  is  to  write  first  of  all  a  good  play)  and  may  be 
compared,  in  theme,  with  such  a  play  as  Candida  or 
The  Lady  from  the  Sea.  Only  here  it  is  the  man  that 
wavers  between  two  women,  going  back  to  his  wife 
after  having  received  from  her  his  freedom  of  choice. 
The  piece  is  distinguished  by  the  exquisite  prose 
that  embellishes  so  much  of  Pinski's  work;  one 
trembles  to  think  what  it  would  become  in  the 
mouths  of  the  ranters  that  constitute,  in  altogether 
too  great  number,  the  Yiddish  world  of  actors. 
Here,  again,  especially  in  the  second  act,  the  del- 
icate symbolism  heightens  the  significance  of  the 
action.  The  drama  is  further  distinguished  from 
the  European  plays  just  mentioned  in  the  fact  that 
The  Little  One,  who  has  for  a  time  won  Gabri's 
love  away  from  his  wife,  in  turn  transfers  her  love 
to  one  of  Gabri's  sons,  even  as  he  has  transferred 
his  from  his  wife  to  her.  With  Banners  of  Victory^ 
a  one-act  play  of  the  same  year,  dealing  with  a 
similar  theme,  is  not  among  Pinski's  happiest  crea- 
tions; it  seems  forced  and  not  sufficiently  char- 
acterized. 


394       THE  DRAMA  OF  TRANSmOM 

Two  years  later,  1910,  came  Mary  Magdalene^  the 
name  of  which  calls  to  mind,  among  the  moderns, 
Maeterlinck  and  Paul  Heyse.  Yet  Pinski's  concep- 
tion of  the  historical  figure  has  little  in  common 
with  either,  and  is  in  some  respects  perhaps  superior 
to  both.  Maeterlinck's  play  has  plenty  of  the 
poetical,  of  the  spectacular;  there  is  little  or  no 
psychology;  his  Mary,  moreover,  is  another  Monna 
Vanna,  with  time  and  circumstance  altered;  indeed, 
it  is  perhaps  the  very  element  in  Heyse's  play  which 
placed  Mary  in  a  forced  choice  between  her  carnal 
and  her  spiritual  lov^e  that  so  attracted  Maeterlinck 
to  the  play  from  which  he  borrowed  the  two  situa- 
tions which  afterwards  occasioned  the  quarrel  be- 
tween him  and  Heyse,  who  was  himself  no  small 
borrower  from  early  Italy  and  Provence.  Such 
choices  were  dear  to  Maeterlinck's  heart,  and  had 
already  occurred  in  more  than  one  of  his  plays. 
Heyse's  play,  more  involved  than  the  Belgian's,  is 
more  essentially  dramatic.  Neither  attempts  to 
depict  the  process  of  Mary's  conversion;  it  is  taken 
for  granted  and  exploited  for  the  chief  situation, 
which  is  in  both  plays  the  same — that  of  Mary's 
choice  between  her  lover  and  the  Xazarene.  And 
in  each  case,  of  course,  Mary  prefers  to  let  the 
Nazarene  die  rather  than  save  him  at  the  cost  of 
violating  his  own  teachings  and  the  faith  he  has 
inspired  within  her. 

It  is  characteristic  of  Pinski's  dramatic  method 
that  in  his  treatment  of  the  theme  he  has  taken 
Mary  at  the  moment  the  conversion  begins  and  has 
chosen  to  make  a  searching  analysis  of  her  soul. 
The  play  is  at  once  a  drama  of  sex,  with  all  the 
freedom  of  treatment  that  the  subject  connotes,  and 


THE  YIDDISH  DRAMA  395 

a  drama,  so  to  speak,  of  Biblical  reconstruction,  thus 
uniting  two  of  the  dramatist's  manners.  But,  like 
all  of  his  historic  or  legendary  plays,  this  one  pos- 
sesses a  most  human  and  contemporary  applica- 
tion. He  conceives  Mary  as  a  woman  who  has 
erected  within  her  a  Venus-religion,  a  faith  in  the 
all-compelling  power  of  her  own  beauty.  Her 
meeting  with  the  Nazarene,  reported  by  herself, 
has  caused  her  faith  to  waver,  but  before  surrender- 
ing she  determines  to  make  a  desperate  resistance, 
to  try  her  charms  upon  the  holiest  men — upon 
Alexander,  one  of  the  leaders  of  the  zealots  and 
hater  of  women;  upon  Amram,  most  pious  of  the 
Jews.  Having  conquered  them,  she  proceeds  to  a 
second  assault  upon  the  Nazarene  (again  reported 
upon  the  scene  as  having  happened)  and  this  time 
her  Venus-faith  is  shattered.  The  dramatist  has 
dissected  the  woman's  soul;  here  is  no  spectacle,  no 
melodramatic  choice  between  the  two  sharp  horns  of 
a  dilemma;  the  drama  is  an  inner  struggle.  Neither 
Maeterlinck  nor  Heyse  has  attempted  so  minute  a 
characterization.  In  neither  of  their  plays  is  there 
the  humor  by  which  Pinski  has  reheved  the  tense 
poetry  of  his  Mary's  struggle.  Pinski's  Mary, 
moreover,  stands  out  in  all  the  bolder  relief  for  the 
figure  of  the  courtesan,  Isabel,  who  pokes  fun  at 
her  companion  to  the  last,  and  robs  her  of  her  jewels 
in  the  final  act  of  the  three.  The  closing  act,  by 
the  way,  is  another  splendid  example  of  the  play- 
wright's crescendo  effects;  opening  upon  a  scene  in 
which  several  suitors  of  Mary  engage  in  a  drunken 
brawl,  its  gradual  ascent  to  Mary's  noble  renuncia- 
tion is  accomplished  with  a  skill  that  achieves  all 
the  sim.plicity  of  the  inevitable.     For  the  rest  the 


396        THE  DRAMA  OF  TRANSITION 

dramatist  has  lavished  upon  the  phiy  some  of  his 
most  poetic  passages,  which  are  the  despair  of  the 
translator.  And  in  one  respect,  at  least,  there  is 
no  doubt  that  he  has  surpassed  both  Heyse  and 
Maeterlinck;  the  fascination  of  his  Mary  is  shown  in 
the  very  words  she  utters;  in  the  uncanny  cleverness 
with  which  she  outwits  the  arguments  of  the  holy 
Amram  and  baffles  all  but  the  Nazarene,  whose  silent 
goodness  at  last  conquers  her  loquacious  sin.  In  the 
moral  of  the  play  (to  risk  a  word  that  connotes  a 
pulpit-thumping  which  is  furthest  from  Pinski's 
methods)  as  in  the  treatment  ot  the  subject,  he  differs 
from  both  the  German  and  the  Belgian.  The  plays 
of  the  latter  emphasize  Mary's  conversion  as  a  divine 
effect  of  Jesus'  influence.  Pinski's  play,  while  show- 
ing this  in  all  the  soul-struggle  of  its  consummation, 
adds  to  it  the  note  of  toleration — "Judge  not,  that  ye 
be  not  judged" — which  was  the  very  element  in 
Jesus'  human  message  that  so  stirred  Mary  back  to 
the  life  of  a  good  woman.  For  the  very  men  in  the 
Pinski  drama  who  have  most  condemned  Eleazer, 
the  leader  of  the  zealots,  for  his  slavery  to  Mary's 
charms,  are  themselves  ready  victims  to  it.  Mary 
Magdalene  belongs  at  the  side  of  The  Treasure  and 
The  Zwie  Family. 

In  the  following  year  (1911)  came  The  Dumb 
Messiah^  another  in  the  historic  series,  which,  in 
the  list  of  the  playwright's  chief  works,  must  be 
placed  together  with  the  three  just  mentioned. 
The  play,  suggested  by  the  expulsion  of  the  Jews 
from  France  in  1306  by  Philip  IV,  and  their  return 
nine  years  later  under  Louis  X,  is  built  upon  an 
original  plot  and  placed  in  the  mythical  land  of 
Illyria.     The  leader  of  the  Jews  here  has  had  his 


THE  YIDDISH  DRAMA  397 

tongue  cut  out  for  his  utterances  against  the  harsh 
King  Philip,  and  together  with  the  whole  Jewish 
population  is  expelled  from  the  country.  The  tongue- 
less  Menahem  has  beheld  a  vision  in  his  prison  cell, 
and  has  felt  that  he  has  been  called  as  the  Messiah 
of  his  people,  to  lead  them  back  to  Zion.  His  daugh- 
ter, Rachel,  shall  be  his  tongue;  and  with  her  great 
eloquence  inspired  by  her  faith  in  her  father,  she 
so  moves  the  suffering  multitude  that  they  com- 
mence the  long  and  weary  journey  to  the  Holy  Land. 
While  they  are  on  the  way  messengers  overtake 
them,  telling  them  that  the  old  king  has  died,  and 
that  the  new  monarch,  Louis,  calls  back  the  Jews. 
Menahem  and  Rachel  are  overwhelmed;  their 
dream  of  Zion  threatens  to  evaporate.  Hillel,  who 
has  fallen  in  love  with  Rachel,  even  attempts  to 
persuade  her  and  her  father  back  to  Illyria,  but 
Menahem  holds  tenaciously  to  his  fanatic  Mes- 
sianic belief  and  still  controls  his  daughter,  his  other 
self,  his  voice.  The  faith  in  his  belief  is  strengthened 
when  Leah,  the  mad-woman,  suddenly  hails  him  as 
the  Messiah  amid  the  awe-struck  wonder  of  the 
crowd.  Rachel,  who  has  begun  to  doubt,  is  thus 
also  reenforced  in  her  faith.  Suddenly,  in  the  midst 
of  an  impassioned  speech  in  which  Rachel  is  winning 
the  wavering  Jews  back  to  the  Zionist  dream,  Leah 
begins  to  call  the  beggar  the  Messiah,  too,  and  even 
Blanche,  the  prostitute.  The  charm  is  broken;  the 
people  turn  from  wonder  to  derisive  laughter; 
Rachel  loses  belief  in  her  father's  mission,  while  he, 
choking  with  rage  in  his  powerlessness  to  speak, 
rushes  upon  a  rock  and  jumps  into  the  sea.  Leah, 
in  her  crazy  dance,  shrieks  "The  Messiah!  The 
Messiah!" 


398        THE  DRAMA  OF  1  RAXSITION 

Here  again  Pinski  has  triumphed  over  the  tech- 
nical difficulties  of  the  crowds  which  he  is  fond  of 
assembling;  here  again,  athwart  a  background  of 
mediaeval  persecution  and  a  case  of  the  religious 
mania  which  it  so  often  inspires,  he  has  thrown  a 
drama  that  abounds  in  color,  spectacle,  striking 
scenes,  and  penetrating  touches.  Menahem  is  a 
religious  Sheftel;  he,  too,  has  in  his  own  fanatic 
way,  beheld  a  vision  beyond  his  powers  to  com- 
municate to  those  about  him,  and  seeks  his  refuge 
in  death. 

The  Mountain  Climbers  (191 2)  is  the  most  purely 
symbolic  of  the  dramatist's  work,  much  weakened 
by  the  somewhat  trivial  personages  and  insignifi- 
cant action  which  contrast  too  strongly  with  the 
attempted  grandeur  of  the  theme.  The  ascent  of 
his  troupe,  and  their  final  arrival  at  the  hotel  at 
the  top,  where  the  great  inn-keeper  receives  them  all 
after  their  weary  climb,  is  an  obvious  symbol  of 
life's  progress — as  obvious,  for  instance,  as  the 
burning  candle  in  Andreyev's  Life  of  Man.  With 
the  ascent  of  his  characters,  so  ascends  the  drama- 
tist's action,  from  the  placid  and  promising  opening 
of  the  first  act,  through  the  varied  tribulations  of 
the  four  couples  depicted  in  the  next  two,  and  the 
peaceful  close,  which,  from  the  standpoint  of  pure 
symbolism,  is  the  most  successful  of  the  four.  At 
the  very  end  of  the  play,  the  great  inn-keeper, 
whose  visage  is  veiled  by  the  eternal  clouds  of 
the  mountain-top,  warms  his  hands  at  the  fire 
which  has  been  made  by  the  two  poetic  lovers 
from  the  twigs  of  a  tree  on  which  they  had 
carved  their  initials  in  token  of  their  great  love. 
The    inn-keeper   approaches    the    fire,  after  he  has 


THE  YIDDISH  DRAMA  399 

closed  the  door  of  the  hotel  upon  the  last  pair 
of  lovers,  and,  rubbing  his  hands  over  the  flames, 
exclaims,  "At  such  a  fire,  I,  too,  may  warm  my- 
self!" It  is  significant  that  Pinski  looks  upon  life 
as  an  ascent  and  upon  love  as  its  really  vivifying 
principle.  To  this  year  belongs  also  To  Each  Man 
His  Own  Gody  in  which  Menasseh  Rivkin,  a  poverty- 
stricken  immigrant,  overcomes  the  temptation  to 
deceit  forced  upon  him  by  his  needy  dependents. 
Losing  an  arm  in  a  street-car  accident  that  was 
meant  to  produce  but  a  profitable  bruise,  he  refuses 
to  accept  the  damages  that  the  company  is  only  too 
willing  to  pay.  He  regards  the  loss  of  his  limb  as 
a  punishment  from  God  and  his  renunciation  re- 
deems him.  Though  there  are  good  scenes  in  the 
play,  it  does  not  rank  with  his  best,  any  more  than 
does  the  play  of  the  following  year  (1913),  Better 
Unborn.  This  is  conceived  in  a  spirit  of  intense 
idealism,  but  the  insistence  upon  harrowing  detail 
only  serves  to  impress  the  contrast  of  the  central 
deed  to  the  circumferential  passion  of  nobility. 
From  the  brutal  murder  of  the  little  girl  discovered 
at  the  opening  to  the  expiatory  suicide  of  the  mur- 
derer at  the  close,  the  drama  envelops  the  auditor 
in  an  atmosphere  of  gloom.  True,  the  play  was 
not  written  for  the  sake  of  the  tense  situations; 
here,  as  always,  Pinski  is  the  psychologist,  and  what 
most  interests  him  is  the  struggle  that  begins  in 
the  protagonist's  mind  after  he  has,  in  a  moment 
of  bestial  passion,  committed  so  vile  a  deed  and 
then  been  convinced  by  his  father  that  for  his  own 
sake,  as  well  as  to  erase  the  blot  upon  his  family 
and  his  race,  he  must  pay  for  the  girl's  life  with  his 
own.     For  persons  with  oversensitive  nerves  Better 


400        THE  DRAMA  OF  TRANSITIOxN 

Unborn  is  better  unseen  and  unread.  There  is  a 
Brutus-like  nobility  in  the  stern  father,  but  the 
regions  are  not  lofty  enough  for  tragedy;  there  is 
something  just  as  barbarous  about  expiatory  suicide 
as  there  is  about  sadistic  child-murder. 

We  come  to  far  better  stuff  in  the  series  of  five 
one-act  plays  written  around  the  wives  of  King 
David;  this,  begun  in  191J  with  Buthsheba^  includes 
Michal^  Abigail y  and  hi  the  Harem,  all  of  1914,  and 
Abishag,  19^5-  In  his  foreword  to  the  translation  of 
The  Treasure,  Ludwig  Lewisohn  ventured  the  opinion 
that  the  prose  of  these  exquisite  plays  is  "as  subtly 
beautiful  as  Maeterlinck's  or  Yeats's;  in  passion 
and  reality  the  Jewish  playwright  surpasses  Ixith." 

Although  the  plays  were  inspired  by  the  Bible, 
they  are  by  no  means  ancient  in  action  or  outlook. 
It  is  one  of  Pinski's  distinguishing  traits  that  what- 
ever he  turns  his  hand  to — be  it  the  proletarian 
drama,  the  Messianic  legend,  or  the  theme  of  dom- 
inant sex — he  is,  first  of  all,  the  modern  psychol- 
ogist, thoroughly  alive  to  what  might  be  called, 
only  in  seeming  paradox,  the  everlasting  contem- 
porary. The  King  David  plays  receive  their  sug- 
gestion, and  in  places,  their  very  text,  from  the 
Holy  Book,  yet  so  deeply  has  the  author  penetrated 
into  his  subject  that  his  dramatic  version  often  in- 
terprets his  source.  He  has  not  hesitated  to  intro- 
duce illuminating  interpolations  nor  to  alter  chrono- 
logical sequence.  And  above  all  the  figure  of  David 
stands  out,  not  as  a  mere  reconstruction  of  sacred 
history,  but  as  a  living  creature,  a  vital  personality 
that  becomes  naturally  a  symbol  of  Man  the  Lover. 

At  first  thought  one  is  prompted,  in  seeking  for 
analogues  in  the  modern  drama,  to  call  King  David 


THE  YIDDISH  DRAMA  401 

and  His  Wives  a  Biblical  Anatol.  I  am  not  at  all 
insensitive  to  Schnitzler's  magic  of  mood  and  his 
deep  sense  of  man's  passional  transiency,  and  though 
I  make  no  pretense  to  establishing  ultimate  hier- 
archies, I  find  in  the  succeeding  scenes  of  the  New 
York  Jew  a  pleasure  equal  to  that  afforded  by  the 
Jew  of  Vienna.  The  significance  of  the  Biblical 
series  is  no  less  pregnant  and  human;  it  possesses 
coherence  and  cumulative  power;  the  plays  (each 
complete  in  itself)  are  more  than  links  in  a  chain; 
they  are  the  rungs  of  a  ladder,  while  Schnitzler's 
episodes  lack  this  rising  continuity.  Pinski's  dramas 
probe  into  the  hidden  recesses  of  a  man's  soul, 
not — as  do  Schnitzler's  episodes — into  an  interest- 
ing corner  of  it.  Where  the  Austrian  dramatist 
refines  upon  a  type,  the  Yiddish  writer  reveals  a  sex. 
Such  a  comparison,  of  course,  is  hardly  fair;  it  is 
merely  a  personal  expression.  One  is  foolish  to  seek 
in  Schnitzler  something  that  he  did  not  intend  to 
put  there.  As  a  study  in  a  lover.  King  David  and 
His  Wives  excels  in  poetry  and  vision;  it  is  inferior 
to  Anatol  in  wit  and  incisive  dialogue.  One  thing, 
however,  I  should  like  to  emphasize:  Pinski's  series 
is  just  as  contemporary  as  Schnitzler's.  The  Yid- 
dish dramatist's  David  is,  in  a  sense,  modern  man 
searchingly  analyzed  and  revealed.  And  modern 
woman?  How  rich  is  Pinski's  series  in  feminine 
portraits  when  his  women  are  compared  with 
Schnitzler's  cocottes  and  demi-mondaines.  There  is 
Bathsheba  with  her  withering  scorn  for  Uriah's 
obedience  to  his  lustful  monarch;  there  is  the  beauty 
of  Abigail's  submission,  the  piquant  quarrel  of  the 
mistresses  in  In  the  Harem^  the  proud  Michal,  who 
will  not  share  her  love  even  with  God.     Alreadv  in 


402        THE  DRAMA  OF  TRANSITION 

In  the  Harem  we  find  David  awakening  to  the  realiza- 
tion of  oncoming  age;  in  Abishag  the  burden  is 
heavy  upon  him.  The  voluptuousness  of  self- 
abnegation  is  not  often  so  potently  displayed.  Old 
David,  afraid  to  taste  young  Abishag's  beauty 
because  to  enjoy  it  would  leave  nothing  more  to 
be  desired, — old  David  living  solely  for  the  goad  of 
that  eternally  unfulfilled  desire — such  a  figure  and 
such  a  conception  is  a  successful  incursion  into 
Schnitzler's  very  province,  David  is  Anatol  turned 
poet;  the  Hebrew  king  is  man,  the  creature  of  pas- 
sion, a  ruler  even  while  he  is  ruled.  Without  any 
intention  of  implying  relative  values,  it  may  be 
said  that  Anatol  is  a  jester  in  the  court  of  King 
David. 

Diplomacy  (191 5)  is  a  rather  obvious  satire  upon 
war-makers,  while  Little  Heroes  (1916),  in  its  pres- 
entation of  childhood's  innocent  sufi^ering  during 
the  senseless  savageries  of  its  ciders,  achieves  gen- 
uine pathos  in  its  grim  humor.  The  Phonograph 
(191 8)  is  chiefly  noticeable  as  a  recent  refurbishing 
of  a  theme  that  preceded  The  Treasure  and  indeed 
suggested  it.  Of  the  long  plays,  the  best  recent  one 
is  Nina  Hardens  Loves  (191 5- 16).  The  piece  be- 
longs with  those  in  which  the  author  is  chiefly  con- 
cerned, with  the  psycholf)gy  of  woman,  and  is  a 
natural  outgrowth  of  the  Biblical  series  of  one-act 
plays.  It  is,  shall  we  say?  a  sort  of  feminine  Anatol. 
It  is  written  with  an  economy  of  means  rather 
unusual  in  Pinski,  and  follows  the  adventures  of 
Nina  after  her  marriage.  It  is  her  fate  to  seek,  by 
her  power  and  beauty,  to  draw  out  the  best  in  men, 
yet  never  to  succeed.  She  is  of  the  type  that  can 
love  more  than  one  at  a  time;  perhaps  at  the  end 


THE  YIDDISH  DRAMA  403 

she  is  herself  spoiled  by  the  contagion  of  evil.  On 
the  evening  of  her  marriage  she  discusses  love  with 
former  suitors;  in  the  second  episode  she  attempts 
to  infuse  a  new  soul  into  the  actor  Henderson,  only 
to  discover  at  the  end  that  her  appeal  to  him  has 
been  but  a  superficial  one;  in  the  third,  Nina  en- 
counters a  changed  revolutionary  agitator,  and  at 
the  end,  the  close  of  her  career  is  foreshadowed  by 
a  diplomatist's  threat  to  destroy  within  her  the 
idea  of  youth.  Nina  is  thus  a  spiritual  sister  of 
Mary  in  Mary  Magdalene^  of  Tille  in  The  Treasure. 
Like  Tille  and  Mary,  so  Nina  lusts  for  power. 

As  Pinski's  women  lust  for  power,  so  his  men 
yearn  for  spiritual  conquest.  Isaac  Sheftel's  in- 
tense will  to  be  and  to  do  crumbles  upon  the  ruins 
of  his  scant  foundations.  Reb  Mayshe,  of  the 
Zwie  family,  falls  upon  the  threshold  of  a  vision 
never  to  be  beheld  by  his  eyes.  The  soul  of  the 
obsessed  Menahem  Penini  founders  likewise  upon 
the  rock  of  disillusionment. 

Throughout  most  of  what  Pinski  has  written  for 
the  stage  there  is  a  humanness,  a  passion,  a  vein  of 
satire  and  genuine  humor,  a  freedom  from  prop- 
agandistic  tendencies  (despite  his  own  definite 
opinions  upon  the  questions  that  vex  the  world) 
and  a  sincere  dedication  to  the  best  that  lies  within 
him.  He  is  a  realist  who  knows  that  life  is  more 
than  tears  and  mire;  a  poet  who  wanders  in  the 
clouds  without  letting  his  feet  long  leave  the  solid 
earth;  a  thinker  free  from  the  curse  of  pedantry. 
A  full  man,  a  rare  spirit,  an  artist  soul.^ 

^The  Treasure,  Three  Plays,  and  Ten  Plays  are  issued  in  English  at  New  York. 


404        THE  DRAMA  OF  TRANSITION 

PEREZ  HIRSCHBEIN 

Hirschbein  has  just  passed  his  fortieth  year. 
Born  the  son  of  a  poor  miller  in  a  small  Russian 
town,  he  became  known  at  twenty-five  as  a  writer 
of  drama  in  Hebrew,  later  in  Yiddish. 

He  has  been  much  influenced  by  the  French 
symbolists  and  mystics,  as  is  attested  by  the  dia- 
logue of  his  plays  and  the  beauty  of  his  prose- 
poems,  though  often  the  dialogue  is  too  tenuous  for 
sustained  action  and  the  beauty  proves  largely 
verbal.  In  many  of  his  one-act  plays  particularly 
he  is  a  dramatist  in  a  secondary  sense  only. 

Take,  as  an  instance  of  his  early  labors,  the  one- 
act  Solitary  IVorlds.  During  the  short  course  of  the 
play  there  is  little,  if  any,  genuine  dialogue.  The 
characters  speak  to  us  by  speaking  only  to  them- 
selves. One  curses  his  fate  in  a  withering  invective; 
another  has  gone  mad  over  Talmudical  disputation; 
a  young  child  draws  designs  upon  the  floor  and  talks 
about  the  music  upstairs  as  if  it  were — as  indeed  it 
is — in  another  world,  and  so  on.  Here  is  a  cellar 
full  of  people,  yet  each  is  a  world  unto  himself. 
Symbolic,  of  course,  as  so  much  of  Hirschbein's 
work  is,  yet  at  times  too  fragile,  pictorial  rather  than 
sustained  by  inner  passion.  There  is  something  of 
this  symbolic  pictorialism  in  most  of  the  man's 
short  pieces,  whether  we  examine  his  Grave  Blos- 
soms of  1906,  or  the  cluster  of  miniatures  written 
during  191 5, — Raisins  and  Almonds^  On  the  Thresh- 
old, Bebele,  The  Storm,  IVhen  the  Dew  Falls.  One 
exception,  surely,  must  be  made:  In  the  Dark,  which 
belongs  to  1906.  Here  plot,  poetry,  and  symbolism 
are    fused    into    a   genuinely    dramatic    whole;    the 


THE  YIDDISH  DRAMA  405 

tragedy  of  poverty  and  shattered  Illusions  is  de- 
picted with  a  poignancy  and  power  that  entitle  the 
piece  to  a  place  among  the  best  in  its  province. 

Yet  there  is  a  certain  beauty  in  even  an  idyll  like 
Bebeky  recounting  the  superstitious  penance  which 
a  mother  takes  upon  herself  for  her  daughter's 
welfare.  And  charm  there  surely  is  in  The  Storm^ 
with  its  illustrative  sub-title:  Once  Upon  a  Time 
the  Jews  Revelled. 

Hirschbein  is  strongly  attracted,  both  in  his 
longer  and  his  shorter  pieces,  to  the  type  of  the  re- 
bellious young  girl.  In  In  the  Dark  the  moody 
heroine  plunges  from  the  darkness  of  her  daily  life 
to  the  deeper  darkness  of  eternal  sleep,  impelled  to 
suicide  by  hopelessness.  On  the  Threshold  shows 
Rosie  superior  to  her  environment,  refusing  to  sac- 
rifice her  youth  to  the  dictates  of  unsympathetic 
tradition.  So,  too,  in  When  the  Dew  Falls,  we  meet 
the  everlasting  contrast  between  that  "crabbed  age 
and  youth"  which  cannot  live  together.  At  the 
falling  of  the  dew  old  age  seeks  refuge  while  youth 
begins  its  revels.  Again,  in  the  early  Grave  Blos- 
somSy  the  spirit  of  youth  rebels  against  the  sterile 
rites  of  mourning;  while  Bella,  the  depressing,  im- 
aginative sister,  sees  horrors  in  the  grave,  Rivke, 
the  buoyant,  gathers  beautiful  blossoms  amid  the 
tombs.  Man,  with  his  own  hands,  buries  worlds  of 
beauty;  such  is  the  burden  of  the  song  at  the  close. 
Yet  again.  Sparks  (1913),  is  symbolic  of  the  undying 
sparks  of  passion  in  the  heart  of  youth  that  has 
early  been  bereft  of  companionship  through  illness 
or  death.  Everywhere,  it  would  seem,  Hirschbein 
is  preoccupied  with  youth;  his  old  folks  talk  of  it, 
his  young  ones  live  in  its  rollicking  insouciance. 


406        THE  DRAMA  OF  TRANSITION 

Yet  only  rarely  is  this  youth  a  passionate,  under- 
standing, revolting  call.  The  maidens  are  most 
often  village  hoydens;  their  swains,  kind-hearted 
bumpkins.  Unless  it  be  an  Itsik  of  The  llauyited 
Inn^  little  daring  enters  the  breasts  of  these  tradi- 
tion-bound sons  of  the  soil.  It  is  from  the  girls, 
nearer  the  core  of  being,  that  hope  of  freedom  comes. 
Yet,  too  often,  only  hope.  They  burn  with  a  mo- 
mentary flame  of  rebellion,  skip  a  few  steps  of  the 
treadmill,  then  resume  the  weary  round. 

Of  the  longer  plays,  I  should  like  to  consider 
some  half-dozen;  a  complete  edition  published  in 
1 91 6,  in  five  volumes,  contains  twenty-six  nieces  in 
all — including  the  shorter  ones — and  is  for  those 
who  love  poetic  beauty,  haunting  charm,  humanity 
in  strange  nKKxls,  delightful  genre  pictures,  and  a 
certain  fantastic  glow. 

Can-ion  was  written  in  \c)o(^.  It  deals  with  the 
rivalry  of  Mendel  and  Berrel  for  the  hand  of  Rosie, 
a  poor  lass  who  suffers  maltreatment  at  the  hands 
of  her  mother.  Rosie  allows  Berrel  to  buy  her  a 
pair  of  much-needed  shoes,  thereby  inflaming  the 
jealousy  of  Mendel.  He  is  goaded  to  propose  to 
her,  and  she  refuses  him,  telling  him  that  he  smells 
of  the  carcasses  in  which  he  deals.  Overwhelmed, 
the  simple  youth  goes  to  his  father,  and  in  wild 
tears  asks  why  he  has  been  maile  a  carcass  of;  to 
add  to  his  woes,  he  gets  news  of  his  mother's  illness, 
and  is  bewildered  between  the  two  blows  of  mis- 
fortune. The  carrion-odor,  the  loss  that  it  seems  to 
have  brought  him,  his  resentment  against  his  father, 
all  conspire  to  madden  him;  at  the  end  he  is  mad 
indeed,  having  slain  his  father  and  appearing  all 
bloody  from  his  own  scratching,  speaking  incoherent 
snatches. 


THE  YIDDISH  DRAMA  407 

Rosie  is  but  another  of  the  Hirschbein  creatures 
who  lust  for  Hfe  all  the  more  because  of  the  terrible 
privations  of  their  desolate  cellar  existence.  But 
the  play  is  noteworthy  chiefly  for  the  portrayal  of 
Mendel's  madness.  Hirschbein  either  cannot,  or 
will  not  pay  much  attention  to  the  upbuilding  of  an 
inevitable  plot,  conditioned  by  the  unfolding  pas- 
sion of  the  characters  themselves.  He  always  in- 
terests, but  often  fails  to  convince.  He  is  very 
evidently  a  fine  spirit,  yet,  as  we  have  already 
hinted,  his  conception  of  the  drama  widens  it  to 
include  much  of  the  pictorial  and  the  conversational 
as  ends  in  themselves,  rather  than  as  the  environ- 
ment of  a  dominant  action. 

Of  texture  less  stout  is  The  Earth  (1907),  which 
is  symbolic  in  a  rather  derogatory  sense,  replete 
with  poetic  discussion  and  Maeterlinckian  languors. 
That  the  play  is  not  essentially  Jewish  need  bother 
us  little;  more  to  the  point,  the  little  plot  there  is 
suffers  from  a  set  of  static  symbols  that  should  have 
been  dynamic  personalities;  there  is  no  character 
development.  The  play  seeks  to  emphasize  the 
sanative  quality  of  contact  with  the  common  mother 
earth;  it  displays,  even  more,  the  unhealthy  quality 
of  the  dramatist's  contact  with  French  symbolism 
at  its  most  deliquescent. 

The  best  of  Hirschbein's  longer  plays  are  those 
in  which  he  himself  establishes  a  restorative  contact 
with  the  earth  that  his  early  years  have  known, 
with  the  simple  folk  among  whom  he  was  reared, 
with  the  bumpkins  and  hoydens  of  peasant  life  as 
he  saw  it  and  felt  it.  Here  he  is  simple,  yet  vigorous; 
the  symbol  arises,  as  always  it  should,  from  the  bare 
facts  of  human  intercourse;  the  poetry  is  inherent 


408        THE  DRAMA  OK   TRANSITKJN 

in  the  expanding  souls  ratlicr  than  in  the  words 
applied.  Two  or  three  of  these  folk  comedies  repay 
more  than  passing  attention. 

A  Forsaken  Nook  was  written  in  1913.  It  is  folk 
drama  of  the  most  legitimate  ap|H:al,  simple  in  at- 
mosphere, technique,  plot,  and  language,  and  in  the 
best  sense  of  the  word,  wholesome.  Filled  with 
deep  sentiment,  it  never  degenerates  into  senti- 
mentality; this  little  corner  ot  the  world,  far  from 
the  hurly-burly  of  agitated  modernity,  is  yet  a 
replica  of  the  greater  bustle  without;  it  has  its 
own  commercial  rivalries,  its  own  love  ilifficulties, 
its  own  philosophies,  none  the  less  profound  for 
being  couched  in  the  humble  tongue  of  humble 
folk,  /f  Farvorjen  Vinkely  from  one  stand|K)int,  is 
a  miniature  Jewish  village  Romeo  and  Juliel^  ending, 
however,  in  joy  rather  than  tragedy,  with  a  victory 
for  ebullient  youth  over  the  prejudices  and  obstinacy 
of  middle  age.  And  appropriately  enf)ugh,  the  recon- 
ciliation is  effected  by  oKl  age,  which  has  known 
both  the  turbulence  of  youth  and  the  iKXJtless 
animosities  of  the  middle  years. 

Notte,  the  son  of  Tutlrus  and  the  father  of  Tsirrcl, 
has  fallen  out  with  Khayim  Hcrsh,  the  father  of 
Noah,  because  Khayim  owns  the  only  wind-mill  in 
the  remote  spot  and  opposes  Notte's  wish  to  branch 
out  as  a  mill-owner  himself.  Notte  is  a  grave- 
digger;  his  daughter  Tsirrel,  he  begins  to  think, 
must  be  brought  up  in  some  other  environment 
than  that  of  tombstones,  and  he  himself  would 
welcome  a  change  from  a  business  that  is  sure  enough 
to  find  customers,  but  which  has  its  unpleasant  side. 
Noah,  recking  little  of  parental  disputes,  is  the  young 
and  ambitious  suitor  of  Tsirrel,  who,  like  more  than 


THE  YIDDISH  DRAMA  409 

one  of  Hirschbein's  maiden  characters  in  his  nu- 
merous plays,  is  of  the  rebellious  type.  She  herself 
may  not  fully  understand  her  rebelliousness,  she 
does  not  reason  the  matter  out,  but  rather  follows 
the  dictates  of  her  instincts,  which  lead  her  to  return 
the  affection  of  Noah.  Yet  if  the  hostility  between 
their  parents  is  not  strong  enough  to  keep  them  alto- 
gether apart,  it  provides  fuel  for  lovers'  quarrels; 
and  since  our  village  pair  are  both  young  and  self- 
willed,  unmindful  of  spring  days  that  speed  all  too 
soon  on  the  wings  of  memory,  they  waste  precious 
moments  in  recriminations  that  neither  means. 
There  is  another  young  man  in  the  case,  it  appears, 
Khatskel  by  name.  Not  that  Tsirrel  smiles  upon  his 
suit,  but  Khatskel,  taking  for  granted  the  father's 
authority  over  the  daughter,  woos  her  through  his 
favors  to  the  father  rather  than  directly. 

Khayim  Hersh,  getting  wind  of  his  son's  court- 
ship, is  seized  with  anger.  This  is  downright  treach- 
ery, right  in  the  bosom  of  his  family.  Notte,  it 
seems,  has  taken  definite  steps  toward  the  erection 
of  a  rival  mill;  the  site,  the  lumber,  and  the  stones 
have  been  procured;  this  news  is  not  calculated  to 
sweeten  Khayim's  temper,  and  a  family  row  is 
provoked,  in  which  not  only  Noah,  but  little  Khayya, 
show  their  aggressive  mettle.  At  the  height  of  the 
domestic  squabble  who  should  enter  but  Krayne, 
Notte's  wife.  Noah  and  Tsirrel  have  had  words, 
and  Tsirrel  has  been  taken  ill;  perhaps  Khayim's 
wife,  Krayzel,  can  step  over  and  banish  the  effects 
of  the  evil  eye  that  has  looked  upon  the  child.  It 
may  be  noticed  here  that  the  wives  of  the  men  are 
by  no  means  so  prompt  to  yield  to  the  animosity  of 
rivalry  as  are  the  men;  it  is  only  when  the  business 


410        THE  DRAMA  OF  TRAXSmON 

virus  enters  the  blood  of  such  as  these  that  they  are 
infected  with  the  dubious  virtues  of  their  husl)ands' 
combativeness.  Throughout  the  play  the  wives  of 
both  contending  parties  cannot  see  why  peace  is 
not  possible,  though  at  moments  they  forget  their 
mission  of  peacemaking,  influenced  more  by  their 
men's  demeanor  than  by  their  own  desires. 

Notte,  fully  as  obstinate  a  fellow  as  Khayim — 
just  as  much  the  stern  father  and  the  domineering 
husband — traces  his  wife  to  the  home  of  his  enemy. 
There  is  a  glowering  encounter  between  the  men, 
but  Krayne  saves  the  day  by  pulling  her  bellicose 
husband  out  of  the  hostile  household. 

Khatskel's  influence  over  Notte  begins  to  appear 
in  all  its  scheming  and  cunning.  He  it  is  who  has 
advanced  the  money  for  the  new  mill's  materials; 
he  enters  the  home  of  his  Tsirrel  with  the  confidence 
of  victory  through  paternal  supj^ort;  Tsirrel,  how- 
ever, will  have  none  of  him;  this  she  makes  clear  to 
Noah,  as  well  as  to  her  sympathetic  mother.  A 
visit  from  Khayim  Hersh  to  discuss  matters  ends  in 
a  break,  and  since  Khatskel  (having  heard  that  the 
bringing  of  the  material  will  be  oppo'sed  by  machina- 
tions of  Noah)  has  hired  some  Gentile  peasants  to 
be  ready  to  earn  their  brandy  by  the  strength  of 
their  arms,  surely  enough  a  brawl  occurs  as  soon  as 
the  material  heaves  into  sight.  Noah,  whose  eye 
has  been  seeking  Khatskel  everywhere,  catches  the 
fellow  and  chases  him  into  the  home  of  his  pros- 
pective father-in-law.  Stones  crash  through  the 
window  of  Notte's  home  and  as  the  curtain  comes 
down  upon  the  third  act,  the  family  feud  has  reached 
its  climax. 

Throughout  the  preceding  action  we  have  noticed 


THE  YIDDISH  DRAMA  411 

that  not  only  are  the  women  of  the  contending 
households  inclined  to  a  peaceful  view  of  matters, 
not  only  are  the  youthful  lovers  faithful  to  one  an- 
other despite  their  pretended  coldness  and  their 
boastful  aloofness,  but  that  Tudrus,  Notte's  father, 
looks  with  little  favor  upon  the  squabble.  He  is  an 
old  man,  with  a  sense  of  life's  true  values;  he  has 
known  Khayim's  own  father — was,  indeed,  the  man 
who  helped  him  get  a  start  in  life,  and  buried  him 
with  his  own  hands.  As  the  father  of  Notte  the 
grave-digger,  who  bequeathed  to  that  worthy  his 
trade,  Tudrus  feels  that  Notte  belongs  at  his  old 
established  business;  as  one  who  has  seen  children 
born  and  who  has  buried  their  parents,  he  knows 
the  moments  that  really  count  in  the  span  between 
the  cradle  and  the  grave.  And  if  these  middle-aged 
fathers  are  intent  upon  letting  their  quarrel  inter- 
fere with  the  happiness  of  their  children,  why,  he, 
too,  is  a  father,  and  will  impose  his  will  upon  Notte. 
He  wishes,  and  will  have,  peace  between  the  fam- 
ilies. What  has  an  out-of-the-way  spot,  a  forsaken 
nook  like  their  hamlet,  to  do  with  two  windmills 
turned  by  rival  hands?  Why  this  unnecessary  war- 
fare? Away  with  such  obstinacy!  Let  the  schem- 
ing Khatskel  get  his  investment  back  and  cease 
bothering  Tsirrel  with  his  unwelcome  affections;  let 
Noah  and  Tsirrel  marry  and  run  the  new  mill  them- 
selves— Noah  has  enough  to  pay  back  Khatskel  for 
the  raw  material. 

The  fathers  make  a  show  of  resistance,  but,  like 
so  much  resistance  that  has  begun  to  crumble  in- 
wardly— like  that  stubborn  opposition  which  is 
itself  often  a  sign  of  unspoken  willingness  to  compro- 
mise— the  feud  comes  to  a  happy,  sudden  termina- 


412        TUE  DRAMA  ol     IKANSITION 

tion.  Tiiilrus'  simple  rc.isonmg,  ;ulclcd  to  the  un- 
spoken predisp)sition  of  the  men,  the  tears  of  the 
women,  and  the  stout  determination  of  the  children, 
leads  to  the  closing  "Mazel  Tov!" — the  congrat- 
ulatory cries  of  good  luck  for  the  young  couple. 

There  are  other  characters  in  the  play  than  those 
mentioned;  particularly  Dohhc,  the  cra/ed  mother, 
whose  five  chiiilrcn  lie  buried  in  Nottc's  grounds; 
at  first  blush  it  would  seem  that  she  is  a  superfluous 
personage;  she  appears  but  a  few  times,  producing 
upon  spectator  and  personages  alike  an  eerie  effect. 
Yet  is  she  not  a  characteristic  figure  of  such  vil- 
lages, anti  moreover  calculated  to  impress  the  audi- 
ence with  the  fleeting  days  of  childhood  and  the 
inherent  folly  and  wrong  of  thwarting  the  legitimate 
aspirations  of  the  younger  ijcneration?  Not  that 
Hirschhein  uses  this  role  or  any  other  to  impress  a 
preconception;  nothing  could  be  further  from  prob- 
lem-drama or  thesis-drama  than  .-/  Funorfcn  I'ifikfl; 
it  is  the  tolk-play  raised  to  a  very  high  artistic  de- 
gree; the  action  is  compact,  the  dialogue  natural, 
these  are  genuine,  unvarnished  folk,  whether  in 
their  hatreds  or  their  aflcctions.  Here  art  conceals 
itself,  indeed,  and  a  natural  effect  is  achieved  with 
unaffected  directness. 

The  B lacks mtth's  Daughters  is,  like  ^  Forsaken 
Nook,  a  genuine  idyll.  What  permanent  feuds  may 
develop  in  a  milieu  such  as  this,  where  the  inhab- 
itants take  with  pious  seriousness  the  injunction 
that  enemies  must  make  up  before  the  annual  Day 
of  Atonement?  What  wild  romances  of  the  heart 
may  blaze  up  amongst  youths  who  ask  fathers  for 
their  maidens'  hands  with  all  the  deference  that 
they   themselves,  when   they  shall   in   turn   become 


THE  YIDDISH  DRAMA  413 

fathers,  will  expect  to  receive  from  the  children  of 
the  next  generation?  The  average  maiden  in  these 
forsaken  nooks  goes  whither  her  father  sends  her;  fa- 
ther and  daughter  alike  hearken  to  the  advantageous 
matches  which  the  traveling  book-vendor  carries 
around  together  with  the  sacred  books  he  sells;  and 
the  vendor,  who  hawks  hearts  as  well  as  tomes, 
finding  every  maiden  beautiful  and  every  wight 
sturdy  and  able,  is  himself  a  sort  of  symbol  as  to 
how  marriage  is  looked  upon.  Not  that  there  is  no 
love  amongst  these  youths;  not  that  marriages  of 
convenience  arranged  in  haste  do  not  in  a  surprising 
number  of  instances  lead  to  long  years  of  happy 
married  life;  not  that  there  is  an  undue  admixture  of 
mercenary  motives.  But  these  simple  folk  have 
acquired  no  coat  of  sophistication;  they  speak  their 
true  mind  as  often  as  not;  the  girl  is  hardly  ashamed 
of  wooing  her  chosen  youth,  and  she  will  fight 
openly  for  her  right  to  him;  the  obdurate  father  will 
listen  to  reason,  and  if  he  has  two  daughters,  pro- 
vided the  elder  is  married  oiff  first  to  a  person  of 
worth,  the  important  thing  is  to  marry  the  second 
off  and  free  himself  of  a  double  burden — the  duty  to 
marry  oflF  his  child  and  the  ease  that  comes  with 
knowing  that  he  need  no  longer  support  her. 

So,  in  the  play  we  meet  the  two  daughters  of 
Nakhmen  Beer,  the  blacksmith.  Leah  Dobbe  and 
Zelda  are  twins;  since,  in  the  orthodox  Jewish  house- 
hold the  matter  of  precedence  among  daughters  is 
of  no  small  importance,  these  two  maidens  are  often 
at  odds  as  to  which  is  really  the  elder.  To  be  sure, 
Zelda,  if  strict  chronological  order  is  to  be  observed, 
was  born  first;  but  then,  hasn't  Leah  grown  up  to 
be  a  big,  strong  lass,  and  does  not  her  very  appear- 


414         IHK  DKANIA  OF  TRANSITION 

ance  proclaim  her  virtual  seniority?  Zclda,  self- 
willed  and  high-spirited  as  she  is,  resents  such  a 
usurpation  of  her  rights;  nor  is  the  resentment  based 
upon  merely  abstract  [principles;  there  is  a  very 
concrete  reason  in  the  person  of  her  father's  hired 
blacksmith,  Nisson  Alter.  Nisson  is  an  active,  in- 
dustrious fellow,  who  has  brought  a  i»reat  deal  of 
trade  to  his  employer,  and  when  the  latter  praises 
him  with  generous  words,  he  plucks  up  the  courage 
to  ask  for  Zelila's  hand.  But  just  at  this  jx)int  a 
traveling  blacksmith  comes  along  asking  for  work. 
As  Xisson  has  only  a  moment  bef()re  been  complain- 
ing that  the  establishment  needs  more  hands,  and 
as  the  applicant  IfK)ks  like  a  worthy  chap,  he  is  en- 
gaged. He  will  live  with  the  rest  of  the  household 
and  make  the  place  his  second  home. 

The  coming  of  the  new  workman,  Borukh  Mayshe, 
brings  new  dissension  into  the  sisters*  lives.  The 
mischievous  self-willed  Zelda,  who  at  first  "stole" 
Nisson  away  from  Leah,  now  has  taken  a  fancy  to 
the  new  man.  Still,  she  anil  Leah  arc  sisters;  be- 
neath their  rivalry  is  the  blood  relationship,  and 
Zelda,  for  some  purpose  of  her  own,  and  to  show 
that  she  is  not  trying  to  steal  IV>nikh  away  from 
Leah,  will  even  let  her  sister  have  some  of  the  love- 
powders  that  she  has  got  from  an  old  woman  skilled 
in  such  matters.  These  Leah  takes,  and  determines 
to  put  in  Borukh's  soup  that  night;  carefully  she 
does  so,  and  is  about  to  serve  it  to  the  young  black- 
smith when  Zelda  manages  to  strike  her  sister's 
arm,  and  the  precious  bowl  of  love-laden  soup  goes 
crashing  to  the  floor. 

Zelda  is  induced  by  her  sister  to  stay  over  at  a 


THE  YIDDISH  DRAMA  415 

relative's  until  the  holidays,  when  the  family  will 
journey  over  by  wagon  and  take  her  back.  In  the 
meantime — and  perhaps  without  Leah's  wishes — 
Nisson  seems  to  have  turned  his  affections  from  one 
sister  to  the  other.  He  is  happy  with  the  one  dear 
charmer  while  the  other  is  away,  and  now  approaches 
the  father  to  ask  for  Leah's  hand.  The  parent  is 
willing;  after  all,  a  marriage  is  a  marriage,  be  it 
Zelda  or  Leah.  But  once  again  Nisson's  proposal 
is  upset,  this  time  by  Zelda's  unexpected  arrival 
from  her  relative  on  the  wagon  of  an  itinerant  book- 
vendor.  Homesickness — and  a  bit  of  lovesickness, 
too — has  brought  her  back  thus  early,  bringing  upon 
the  scene  the  picturesque  vendor  himself. 

The  hawker  of  hearts  and  books  for  a  moment 
sees  good  prospects  of  earning  an  honest  ruble  by 
matching  off  the  youths  upon  whom  he  comes. 
Zelda,  however,  is  of  the  type  that  matches  off  her- 
self; perhaps  her  short  absence  has  taught  her  that 
Nisson  is  the  man  she  really  wants.  At  any  rate,  like 
the  perverse  imp  she  is,  no  sooner  does  she  get  an 
inkling  that  Nisson  desires  Leah  than  she  desires 
Nisson  with  all  the  energy  of  her  willfulness.  Borukh 
has  a  word  to  say  in  this,  too.  What  does  Nisson 
mean  by  trying  to  take  away  Leah  from  him?  If 
the  match  is  a  settled  one,  very  well;  he  will  leave. 
Fortunately  here  is  the  itinerant  vendor,  who  will 
take  him  off  to  some  other  spot,  where  he  can  hire 
out  his  services  anew.  But  where  are  his  tools? 
Who  has  hidden  them?  (Zelda  could  answer  if  she 
chose.  Once  she  wished  him  to  stay  because  she 
thought  she  would  like  to  have  him  for  her  own; 
now  let  him  stay  so  as  to  remove  Leah  from  between 


416        THE  DRAMA  OK  TKAVsI  TION 

her  and  Nisson.)  Surely  enough  lionikh  has  his 
way  with  Leah,  and  Nisson,  who  was  fond  of  Zclda 
in  the  first  place,  is  fond  of  her  in  the  last,  ttx). 

Here,  as  in  ./  Forsaken  Nooky  there  is  a  wise 
grant! father,  whose  favorite  Hebrew  chant  about 
praising  (lod  at  dawn  for  the  light  of  the  stars  is 
redolent  of  that  deep  appreciation  of  youth  which 
rises  from  so  many  of  Hirschbein's  ilramas.  Like 
the  play  of  the  village  R</meo  anJ  Juliet^  so  this 
rustic  Comedy  of  Errors  is  simple,  idyllic,  pictorial, 
though  by  no  means  static,  and  in  more  than  one 
point  well  sustains  comparison  with  the  plays 
from  the  Irish  company  that  made  Lady  Gregory's 
name  well  known  in  this  country.  And,  if  there 
must  be  C(Miiparisons,  the  folk-pieces  of  Hirschbein 
are  to  be  founil  much  nearer  in  spirit  to  the  comedies 
of  Lady  Gregory,  let  us  say,  than  to  the  sterner 
realities  of  Synge.  Hut  let  us  not  hasten  to  compare. 
It  is  in  such  pieces  as  these,  free  of  the  sometimes 
baffling  symbolism  of  such  of  his  dramas  as  The 
Earth  and  The  Haunted  Inn  that  Hirschbein  is 
refreshingly  himself.  Here  he  is  not  only  the  play- 
wright, but  the  |M)et  as  well-  a  writer  of  a  charm 
that  is  something  more  than  the  echo  of  words 
and  the  melody  of  phrases;  above  all  these  quarrels 
of  lovers,  these  domestic  altercations,  these  tea-{X)t 
tempests  that  loom  so  large  in  the  pastoral  regions 
where  his  muse  has  her  favorite  spot,  rises  an  aroma 
of  enchanting  powers — a  volatile  essence,  indeed, 
but  as  rare  upon  our  stage  as  any  other  of  the  more 
delicate  qualities  of  art. 

The  same  wholesome  simplicity — both  of  the  life 
pictured  and  the  means  by  which  it  is  portrayed — 
informs  the  comedy  Green  Fields  (1916),  in  which  a 


THE  YIDDISH  DRAMA  417 

wandering  pious  student  innocently  disturbs  the 
hearts  of  a  pair  of  lasses  who  at  last  break  down  his 
adolescent  asceticism.  Of  course  he  can  marry  only 
one,  and  before  that  one  wins  him  definitely  away 
from  the  other,  the  parents  of  both  are  drawn  into  the 
inevitable  rural  feud,  which  ends  quite  as  suddenly 
as  it  begins.  There  is  a  family  resemblance  to  these 
folk  comedies  of  Hirschbein,  as  there  is  to  his  one- 
act  pieces;  yet  it  is  an  engaging  family,  and  one 
that  is  met  too  infrequently  upon  any  stage. 

Of  the  more  serious  pieces,  A  Life  for  a  Life  (191 5) 
contains  good  dramatic  action,  though  it  is,  like  so 
many  of  the  man's  other  pieces,  deficient  in  char- 
acterization and  in  the  delineation  of  the  minor 
figures.  Israel  Neakh  offers,  for  the  privilege  of 
laying  a  synagogue  cornerstone,  to  donate  the 
weight  of  the  stone  in  gold.  His  wife.  Pearl,  is 
thunderstruck  when  she  hears  of  it,  but  her  dumb- 
foundedness  increases  when  Israel's  partner,  Tevye, 
bursts  into  her  home  and  declares  that  it  is  his 
money  that  will  really  build  the  edifice,  and  that  he 
will  proclaim  it  to  the  world.  Neakh,  in  truth,  is 
reduced  to  poverty;  his  daughter's  marriage  is  thus 
postponed  indefinitely;  his  wife,  having  lost  all  de- 
sire to  live,  regains  her  passion  for  existence  as  she 
feels  a  new  life  burgeoning  under  her  heart.  Neakh 
subsequently  refuses  his  former  partner's  offer  to 
begin  anew  in  the  old  union;  he  has  taken  his  past 
to  heart;  rapidly  he  fails,  at  last  expiring  in  the 
Rabbi's  arms.  His  own  life  thus  has  paid  for  the 
life  of  the  child  whom  his  prayers  and  charities  (at 
Tevye's  expense)  have  called  into  being.  Now  Pearl 
will  live  for  her  child,  and  the  marriage  of  his 
daughter  is  assured. 


418         IHI-.  DRAMA  OF  TKAN-sHION 

There  is  a  certain  |><)wer  in  the  treatment  of  the 
Jewish  theme;  Israel  Neakh  is  a  salient  figure,  strong 
and  imp">lacal)le. 

It  was  with  The  Haunted  Inn  that  nirschl>cin's 
name  really  cleareii  the  barriers  of  the  Vitklish 
milieu  and  for  a  while  attracted  the  attention  of 
Gentile  critics.  This  was  the  play  with  which  the 
Jewish  Art  Theatre  of  New  York,  umicr  the  direc- 
tion of  Mr.  Kmannuel  Reicher,  inaugurated  its  career 
in  the  autumn  of  lyi^.  Hy  virtue  of  the  striking 
production  and  the  acting  of  Mr.  J.  Ben-Ami  in 
the  role  of  Itsik,  the  drama  was  scx>n  the  talk,  not 
only  of  the  Yiddish  reviewers,  hut  also  of  the  critics 
of  the  Knglish  press,  who  forstxjk  Broadway  for 
Madison  .Avenue  and  Twenty-seventh  Street  and 
long  made  the  play  the  subject  of  enthusiastic  com- 
ment. It  is  this  play,  inileeii,  that  led  to  Mr.  Ben- 
Ami's  rapid  transfer  to  the  Knglish-s|x:aking  stage; 
all  the  more  pity,  then,  that  when  it  was  ijiven  in  an 
English  version  it  was  baiUy  garbled,  the  last  act 
omitted,  and  the  entire  emphasis  of  the  play  shifteil 
from  that  of  a  symbolic  presentation  of  youth's  raw, 
shifting  instincts  and  parental  harshnci^  amid  an 
atJTKDsphere  of  superstitious  obsession,  to  one  of 
aimlessly  romantic  maundering. 

Although  I  believe  Mirschbcin's  folk-plays  of 
better  stuff,  there  is  good  writing  in  The  Haunted 
Inn.  So  much  of  the  drama  is  done  with  Mr.  Hirsch- 
bein's  sensitivity  to  subdued  tones  that  not  a  little 
of  its  quality  is  sure  to  be  missed  by  most  spec- 
tators untrained  to  alertness  for  subtle  values;  here 
color  tends  to  subside  into  nuance,  and  action  is 
refined  into  the  suggestion  of  impulse  and  mood. 
Thus,  at  first  blush,  the  opening  act  seems  a  calm 


THE  YIDDISH  DRAMA  419 

procession  of  rustic  types,  yet  every  event  and 
mood  of  the  play  is  introduced  and  forecast.  The 
arbitrary  choice  of  Meta's  husband  by  the  fathers 
on  both  sides;  the  previous  understanding  between 
the  girl  and  Itsik;  the  motif  of  the  abandoned  inn 
and  the  unmentionable  spirits  supposedly  inhabit- 
ing it;  the  rebellion  of  the  daughter  as  foreshadowed 
by  the  closing  scene,  in  which  she  waves  her  hand 
to  Itsik  in  the  darkness;  the  entirely  natural  chatter 
of  the  grandfather  bent  upon  the  barn  and  its  calves, 
in  which  are  seen  symbolized  the  home  and  the 
girl's  eagerness  for  escape  into  a  life  of  her  own — 
in  these  we  have  the  play  in  Httle,  of  which  all  that 
follows  is  the  logical  unfolding. 

One  thing  in  particular  deserves  emphasis: 
throughout  the  play  the  mysterious  and  super- 
natural mood  is  upon  us,  even  as  upon  the  dwellers 
in  the  hamlet  of  the  action.  Yet  in  no  instance 
does  the  playwright  summon  the  aid  of  arbitrary 
forces;  nowhere  does  he  introduce  any  element  not 
inherent  in  the  very  existence  of  his  characters. 
To  them  their  superstitions  are  part  of  their  every 
thought  and  act,  not,  as  with  our  more  sophisticated 
selves,  an  amusing  and  instructive  detail  of  psy- 
chological study.  The  spirits  of  the  inn  are  real; 
they  may  be  offended,  they  may  pursue  their  vic- 
tims, they  must  be  propitiated.  Hirschbein  here 
achieves  an  effect  of  other-worldliness,  of  unreality, 
without  once  employing  any  means  other  than  those 
of  everyday  reality.  I  have  mentioned  the  spirits 
of  the  inn.  Take  now  the  merchants  of  the  colorful 
wedding  scene  in  the  second  act.  Nothing  more 
natural  than  that  a  party  of  men  should  pause  on 
their  way  to  join  the  festivities,  providing  not  only 


420        THE  DRAMA  OF  TRANSITION 

music,  but  handsome  gifts  for  the  couple,  and  then 
pass  on.  Yet  to  the  relatives  and  guests  assembled, 
in  whose  minds  the  inn  is  closely  linked  to  the  dowry, 
and  in  whom  stirs  the  uneasiness  of  having  disturbed 
the  evil  ones  in  their  nest,  the  strangers,  because  of 
their  very  strangeness,  may  easily  become  ambas- 
sadors of  those  spirits.  Add  to  this  the  kidnapping 
of  the  bride  by  her  primitive  lover,  Itsik,  and  how 
can  they  doubt  any  longer  that  malignant  influences 
are  at  work? 

What  does  the  abandoned  inn  symbolize?  Paren- 
tal restraint  of  young  daughters,  which  often  ends 
by  conquering  the  daughters  themselves?  As  sug- 
gested, for  example,  by  Meta's  desire  to  jump  into 
the  flames  whence  Itsik  saves  her?  Is  Itsik  the 
symbol  of  crude  unconventionality ?  Bcndct,  the 
obdurate  father,  becomes  so  obsessed  with  the  fear 
of  the  spirits  that  he  flees  from  them  and  finally 
sets  fire  to  all  his  possessions.  He  presents,  indeed, 
an  interesting  study  in  the  progress  of  superstitious 
fear,  perhaps  remorse.  The  play,  however,  is  not 
exclusively  symbolistic;  it  has  its  moments  of 
realism  and  romantic  ardor,  and  is,  as  a  whole,  dis- 
tinguished for  a  subtly  managed  mood  of  mystery. 
Of  character  portrayal  there  is  characteristically 
little;  mood  foreshadows  mood,  much  as  in  other 
plays  events  foreshadow  events.  Even  to  the  Jew 
the  whole  is  somewhat  exotic. 

NEW  WRITERS 

Kobrin,  Asch,  Pinski,  Hirschbein — they  are  all 
very  active  yet,  and  anything  like  definite  pro- 
nouncements upon  them  would  be  premature. 
Among  the  lesser  lights,   a  number  of  men   show 


THE  YIDDISH  DRAMA  421 

promise,  one  of  them  a  recent  arrival  from  Poland, 
Fishel  Bimko  by  name.  Maurice  Schwartz,  to 
whom  the  Yiddish  stage  owes  some  of  its  most 
artistic  ventures,  introduced  him  here  through  the 
play  called  Thieves.  Bimko  is  on  the  sunny  side  of 
forty  and  has,  besides  writing  a  long  list  of  short 
stories,  been  occupied  in  journalism  for  the  leading 
newspapers  of  the  foreign  Jewish  centres.  He  has 
to  his  credit  two  or  three  other  dramas  of  a  symbolic, 
mystical  cast — and  how  the  Jewish  mind  is  be- 
trayed into  these- alluring  pitfalls! — but  Thieves  is 
reality  almost  photographic.  It  has  been  given 
some  two  hundred  times  in  Warsaw  and  Vilna. 

There  is  little  in  the  play  to  suggest  the  symbolism 
and  mysticism  of  his  other  work;  it  is,  in  no  derog- 
atory sense  of  the  word,  sternly  realistic  material, 
treating  a  subject  that  to  many  must  be  of  the 
most  repulsive  nature,  yet  so  handling  the  matter 
as  to  produce  a  certain  dramatic  beauty — the  beauty 
of  the  sun  illuminating  an  infested  marsh. 

Here  we  have,  in  the  first  place,  a  half-dozen 
underworld  men  each  engaged  in  the  same  traffic, 
yet  requiring  distinct  characterization  if  they  are 
not  to  become  a  six-fold,  boresome  reflection  of  a 
single  type.  Here  we  have  a  slum  woman,  raised 
by  preference  of  the  gang  leader  to  the  relative 
dignity  of  wifehood,  such  as  their  milieu  knows  it. 
Yet  even  these  lawless  haunts  feel  the  necessity  for 
some  higher  striving;  though  they  may  find  ready 
excuse  for  the  trade  they  ply,  though  they  may 
consider  themselves  even  removed  from  the  neces- 
sity of  justification,  there  are  those  among  them 
who  long  for  something  better.  It  may  be  the 
reawakening  of  religious  fears  instilled  in  childhood; 


422        THE  DRAMA  OF  TRANSITION 

it  may  be  simply  the  natural  desire  to  excel,  to  stand 
out  from  one's  fellow-men,  be  the  claim  to  distinc- 
tion ever  so  small.  But  the  feeling  is  there,  and 
even  among  these  Gorkian  "ex-men"  there  is  the 
sense  of  caste. 

Shloyme  Shuver,  who  has  married  Gittcl,  grand- 
daughter of  the  barber-woman,  Keyle,  is  the  leader 
of  the  thieves.  Ever  since  his  marriage,  however, 
his  hand  seems  to  have  lost  its  cunning,  and  his 
heart  has  gone  completely  over  to  his  wife.  .As  it 
turns  out  later,  he  beholds  in  her,  not  only  the 
woman,  but  the  vessel  of  redemption.  It  is  the 
child  that  she  will  give  him  who  will  come  to  wipe 
out  his  past — to  cleanse  him  of  the  evil  which 
blackens  his  soul.  The  rest  of  the  gang  are  dis- 
gusted with  this  change  in  their  chief.  Not  only 
can  they  not  understand  his  altered  ways,  but  they 
poke  fun  at  him  for  his  chicken-hearted  courtship 
of  his  coquettish  wife.  He  is  so  "touchy"  about 
her — so  watchful,  that  none  may  approach  her — as  if 
she  were  indeed  a  lady.  The  tragedy  of  Shloyme's 
life  begins  with  his  realization  that  he  cannot  have 
a  child,  and  that  the  trouble  does  not  lie  with  his 
wife.  He  broods  himself  into  utter  uselessness  as  a 
gang  leader,  and  all  the  while  his  wife's  affections 
really  belong  to  Mazik,  as  spry  and  handsome  a 
thief  as  ever  carried  a  jimmy.  The  inevitable 
happens;  Mazik  and  Gittel  have  secret  meetings, 
and  before  long  Gittel  confides  an  interesting  secret 
to  her  grandma.  The  latter,  at  first  uninformed  as 
to  the  whole  truth,  receives  the  news  with  all  the 
joy  that  it  would  bring  to  the  orthodox  Jewish 
household;  indeed,  even  old  Keyle  has  a  little  re- 
ligion  in   her   for   all    her  living   in   a    thieves'   den. 


THE  YIDDISH  DRAMA  423 

Has  she  not  sent  Gittel  to  the  rabbi,  even  to  witches, 
for  a  remedy  against  the  curse  that  has  brought 
Shloyme  such  agony? 

Slowly  the  truth  unfolds.  Shloyme  himself  sus- 
pects, and  after  the  child  is  born  he  spends  hours 
gazing  at  its  face,  trying  to  make  out  whether  it 
resembles  him  or  another.  Because  of  his  preoccu- 
pation with  the  infant, — a  preoccupation  that  is 
steadily  growing  into  an  obsession — the  gang's 
plans  go  awry;  his  fellow- thieves  tease  and  taunt 
him  with  cutting  references  to  the  dubious  paternity 
of  the  child,  and  at  last,  from  the  lips  of  his  own 
wife,  who  has  long  since  lost  all  love  for  him,  comes 
the  confession  that  Mazik,  not  Shloyme,  is  the 
father.  Obsession  now  flames  to  insanity,  and  in  a 
wild  fury,  after  gathering  some  clothes  and  setting 
fire  to  them  so  as  to  burn  down  the  house,  Shloyme 
strangles  his  faithless  wife. 

It  is  characteristic  of  the  entire  play  that  the 
strangling  scene  does  not  take  place  in  view  of  the 
audience;  nor  is  this  because  the  Jewish  spectator 
shares  any  Greek  aversion  to  the  representation  of 
such  events.  Thieves  is  genuine  drama,  with  little 
affinity  to  its  step-brother  melodrama;  its  char- 
acters are  well  distinguished  from  one  another,  and 
though  it  would  be  presumption  for  one  who  does 
not  know  the  Varsovian  underworld  to  comment 
upon  the  author's  truthful  portrayals,  it  is  enough 
for  the  purposes  of  art  to  agree  that  he  makes 
us  feel  they  are  true.  The  play  as  a  whole  has 
been  called  a  Yiddish  Na  dnye  (Gorki's  Night 
Lodging)^  and,  to  be  sure,  there  is  a  certain  resem- 
blance. In  both  plays  there  is  a  motif  of  violent 
love,  in  each  there  is  a  breath  of  aspiration  to  higher 


424        THE  DRAMA  OF  TRANSITION 

things,  though  this  is  conveyed  more  poetically, 
more  elusively,  by  Luka  of  Gorki's  striking  piece; 
in  each  there  is  a  v.ell-differentiated  group,  though 
here  again  the  advantage  is  with  Gorki,  whose 
drama  is  of  deeper  philosophical  import  and  of 
broader  application.  Bimko's  thief-psychology  is  an 
incidental,  however,  rather  than  a  salient,  trait;  it 
is  directed  not  so  much  upon  the  group,  as  in  Gorki's 
piece,  as  upon  Shloyme  and  his  strange,  though  by 
no  means  unnatural,  desire  for  redemption.  T/iieveSy 
then,  has  stronger  ideological  resemblance  to  Sholom 
Asch's  T/je  God  of  Feugeance.  And  it  is,  by  the  way, 
this  same  Sholoin  Asch's  picturesque  novel  Mottke 
the  Vagabond  {Mottke  Ganov),  which,  in  its  third 
part,  gives  us  an  intimate  insight  into  the  very 
Varsovian  slums  that  provide  the  background  for 
Bimko's  play.  Yekel,  in  the  Asch  play,  it  will  be 
recalled,  cherishes  the  same  eagerness  for  redemp- 
tion through  his  daughter,  and  even  gives  holy 
gifts  to  the  synagogue,  paid  for  with  money  made 
in  the  most  nefarious  of  trades;  yet  despite  his 
attempt  to  bribe  the  Lord,  his  daughter  falls  a 
victim  to  the  very  brothel  her  father  runs.  In  each 
play,  then,  is  a  theme  of  retribution  that  falls  upon 
the  perpetrators  of  evil  and  sweeps  even  the  inno- 
cent in  its  path.  In  both  is  a  strange  yet  character- 
istic separation  of  secular  and  sacred,  and  an  unsuc- 
cessful attempt  to  reconcile  them.  Though  once 
more  the  advantage  may  lie  with  the  other  author. 
Thieves  may  well  be  said  to  provide  a  worthy  addi- 
tion to  the  Yiddish  repertory  of  "unpleasant"  plays. 
And,  finally,  before  leaving  a  by-path  of  the  drama 
over  which  we  have  lingered  only  because  it  is  so 
unlikely   to   receive   adequate   attention   among   its 


THE  YIDDISH  DRAMA  425 

own  people,  let  alone  those  outside  the  pale  of 
tongue  and  temperament,  let  us  consider  the  bold 
choice  made  by  Mr.  Schwartz  for  the  opening  of 
the  season  of  1921-1922  in  the  Jewish  Art  Theatre. 

An-ski's  Der  Dibbuk  belongs  to  the  dramatic  lit- 
erature that  must  be  taken  largely  upon  faith;  it  is 
a  world  where  Hamlet's  father  may  return  as  a 
ghost  without  being  assailed  upon  scientific  and 
rational  grounds;  a  world  in  which  the  dead  may 
converse  with  the  living;  indeed,  an  inter-world. 
The  Vilna  edition  of  191 9,  as  a  matter  of  fact,  bears 
the  sub-title,  Between  Two  Worlds^  thus  revealing 
this  sense  of  a  spiritual  limbo. 

Schwartz's  venture  was  daring  in  more  ways  than 
one;  the  piece  is  in  reality  a  transcription  of  folk- 
lore. It  is  necessary  to  recall,  even  for  many  Jews, 
the  pecuHar  background  against  which  it  is  played, 
— the  intense  Khassidic  life  where  the  most  ardent 
fancies  somehow  acquire  a  reality  almost  as  real  as 
the  very  ground  over  which  the  engrossed  Rabbis 
wend  their  way  from  synagogue  to  home  and  back 
again.  The  piece  requires  a  sympathetic  heroine 
in  whom  the  male  voice  of  her  departed  lover  speaks 
his  soul  through  her  body.  The  full  production 
involves  about  a  hundred  persons,  of  whom  twenty- 
five  take  active  parts. 

The  title  of  the  play  is  a  Hebrew  word  of  kabbal- 
istic  derivation,  signifying  an  evil  spirit  that  enters 
a  person. 

We  are  here  in  a  world  where  the  dividing  line 
between  the  now  and  the  beyond  is  a  tenuous  one; 
the  "true  world,"  in  fact,  is  the  hereafter,  and  it  is 
so  named.  Yet  the  dead  form  part  of  the  present 
existence    almost    as    much    as    when    their    bodily 


426        THE  DRAMA  OF  TRANSITION 

forms  strode  through  it;  their  graves  are  reguhirly 
visited,  and  they  are  spoken  to,  communed  with 
upon  the  most  intimate  secrets,  invited  to  the  wed- 
dings of  their  orphans,  taken  tender  leave  of  when 
their  offspring  depart  for  distant  lands  in  quest  of 
a  better  fortune.  These  strangely  living  dead  appear 
in  dreams  and  make  their  wishes  known,  recite 
their  grievances  against  the  dwellers  in  the  present, 
and  even  answer  summonses  to  rabbinical  trials  in 
which  the  merits  of  the  case  are  heard  before  a  holy 
tribunal.  Almost  literally,  then,  the  Jews  of  this 
Khassidic  sect  and  milieu  live  "between  two  worlds," 
communing  too  much  with  the  life  everlasting  to 
remain  wholly  on  this  side  of  paradise.  It  is  such  a 
world  in  which  An-ski*s  peculiar  play  comes  to  pass, 
and  in  a  reading  of  the  drama  or  in  any  discussion 
concerning  it,  care  should  be  taken  not  to  dismiss 
as  palpably  unreal,  or  unconvincing,  episodes  that 
would  hardly  be  questioned  by  the  persons  among 
whom  the  events  supposedly  occur. 

S.  An-ski's  correct  name  was  Shlovme  Zalmon 
Rappoport;  his  recent  death  removed  from  Yiddish 
letters  a  beloved  figure  who  was  very  close  to  the 
soil  of  the  folk.  In  a  sense  he  is  said  to  have  been 
much  closer  than  the  greatest  writer  in  the  short 
but  intense  history  of  Jewish  literature,  Isaac  Loeb 
Perez.  Perez,  intellectual  that  he  was,  was  also 
more  the  artist  than  An-ski;  he  could  not  be  content 
with  mere  transcription  of  folk-motives,  though  he 
is  thoroughly  imbued  with  the  folk-spirit.  Where 
Perez  would  elaborate  without  destroying,  An-ski 
would  reproduce  faithfully.  Such  a  method,  of 
course,  entails  the  risk  of  certain  defects  of  stage- 
craft, and  we  shall  note  that  An-ski  has  not  escaped 


THE  YIDDISH  DRAMA  427 

them.  It  responds,  however,  to  a  strong  need  of 
the  Jewish  reader  and  audience,  satisfying  a  pleasure 
of  recognition  that  forfeits  with  a  certain  ease  most 
claims  to  more  refined  artistic  treatment.  This  is 
not  to  say  that  An-ski's  play  lacks  art;  but  surely, 
either  through  temperament  or  set  purpose,  he  has 
in  Der  Dibbuk  eschewed  delineation  and  develop- 
ment of  character  and  concerned  himself  chiefly 
with  pictorial  presentation. 

This  is  not  at  all  an  unwise  course  to  follow  where 
legend  lies  at  the  root  of  life.  Moreover,  so  remark- 
ably has  the  dramatist  reproduced  the  throng  of  re- 
ligious devotees  that  the  drama  as  a  whole  is  steeped 
in  the  communal  character.  So  well  has  this  part 
of  An-ski's  labor  been  performed  that  the  play, 
despite  any  dramaturgic  shortcomings  that  may  be 
urged  against  it,  has  been  hailed  upon  both  sides  of 
the  ocean  as  an  epoch-making  event  in  the  Yiddish 
drama,  and  even  as  the  "first  Jewish  national  play." 
Perhaps,  and  perhaps  not.  An  intimate  view  of  a 
certain  phase  of  Yiddish  life  it  doubtless  afl^ords. 
But  "national".^  In  what  sense .^  Certainly  not 
that  of  national  aspirations,  with  which  it  has 
nothing  whatsoever  to  do.  And  is  the  view  of  love 
— that  of  a  foreordained  union  with  which  mortals 
vainly  interfere — a  typically  Jewish  one,  a  national 
view?  In  such  a  sense,  is  not  Hirschbein's  Green 
Fields  just  as  "national"  as  Der  Dibbuk?  In  the 
politico-philosophical  acceptation  is  not  Pinski's 
The  Last  Jew  {Die  Familie  Zwie)  just  as  "national"? 
At  any  rate,  questions  of  priority  are  meat  for  his- 
torians' appetites;  they  have  nothing  to  do  with 
art.  It  is  easier  to  grant  the  epoch-making  qualities 
of  An-ski's  play,  which  let  us  summarize  before 
appraising. 


428        THE  DRAMA  OF  TRANSITION 

The  auditorium  is  plunged  into  dense  darkness, 
out  of  which,  as  from  a  distance,  floats  a  soft,  mystic 
chorus.  In  this  the  dramatist  has  perhaps  sought 
to  concentrate  the  underlying  thought  ot  his  play; 
I  translate  it  rather  closely: 

Wherefore,  O  wherefore 

Is  the  soul 

Fallen  from  highest  estate 

Into  darkest  depths? 

Within  itself  the  fall 

Bears  the  ascension.     .     .     . 

Then  the  curtain  rises  upon  the  play. 

Hannon,  a  poor  student  of  religious  lore,  is  by 
nature  given  to  mysticism  and  the  maddening  in- 
tricacies of  kabbala,  according  to  which  every  letter, 
numeral,  or  word  has  its  occult  significance  in  the 
unraveling  of  the  divine  mysteries.  Homeless  wan- 
derer that  he  is,  he  has  been  taken  in  by  the  wealthy 
Reb  Sender,  according  to  a  charitable  custom 
whereby  the  better-favored  Jews  freely  boarded  the 
humble  students  of  the  local  House  of  Study.  In 
this  prosperous  home  Hannon  conceives  a  passionate 
affection  for  the  daughter,  Leah — a  typically  pious, 
obedient  child  of  the  race.  It  is  common  talk  that 
Sender  seeks  for  his  child  the  most  advantageous 
match  he  can  find,  and  the  tale  of  his  quest  and  his 
succession  of  refusals  is  told  by  the  pious  students 
to  one  another  between  devotions.  That  nothing 
comes  of  the  attempt  to  match  Leah  off  is  a  source 
of  exalted  gratification  to  her  lover,  for  Hannon 
believes  that  it  is  his  intense  faith  and  his  frequent 
fastings  that  have  intervened  to  keep  her  for  his 
own.  Now  comes  the  news  that  Sender  has  at  last 
betrothed   his   daughter   to   Menassah,   son   of   the 


THE  YIDDISH  DRAMA  429 

wealthy  Nahmen  of  the  nearby  town,  Miropolia. 
Hannon's  pious  deeds,  then,  despite  his  feehng  that 
a  higher  power  has  foreordained  him  as  Leah's 
mate,  have  proved  of  no  avail.  Suddenly,  in  the 
synagogue  where  the  news  reaches  him,  he  seems  to 
behold  a  new  light,  and  falls  to  the  floor  in  a  sleep 
of  death. 

A  strange  fellow,  this,  who  has  had  the  temerity, 
not  only  to  think  queer  thoughts,  but  to  utter  them 
to  his  fellow-students,  who  gaze  upon  him  almost  as 
if  he  spoke  blasphemy.  What  else  are  they  to  im- 
agine of  a  kabbalist  who  tells  them  that  "it  is  un- 
necessary to  wage  war  against  sin;  one  need  but 
refine  it.  Even  as  a  goldsmith  purifies  gold  in  an 
intense  fire  ...  so  should  one  purify  sin  of  its 
evil,  that  only  the  holy  kernel  remains."  Hannon 
speaks,  indeed,  as  if  he  had  seen  a  vision  of  the  es- 
sential unity  of  sin  and  virtue,  for  to  him,  "every- 
thing that  God  has  created  holds  within  it  a  spark 
of  holiness."  But  three  months  later,  when  Leah  is 
to  be  married  to  Menassah,  Hannon  has  been  quite 
forgotten;  except  by  her,  to  whom  his  grave  has  ap- 
peared in  a  dream,  as  well  as  his  spirit.  When,  just 
before  the  ceremony,  the  bride  goes  ofi^  to  the  cem- 
etery to  the  grave  of  her  mother,  to  invite  her  de- 
parted parent  to  the  wedding,  she  steals  over  to 
Hannon's  grave,  too,  and  extends  the  same  invita- 
tion. It  is  here,  presumably,  that  Hannon's  spirit 
merges  with  her  own,  for  when  she  returns  to  her 
home  the  great  change  has  taken  place  in  her  soul. 
Scarcely  has  the  ceremony  begun  when  Leah  tears 
off  her  bridal  veil  and  refuses  to  go  on  with  the 
pact.  Imploring  the  intercession  of  a  legendary 
pair  of  ever-faithful  lovers  whose  tomb  lies  nearby. 


430        THE  DRAMA  OF  TRANSITION 

she  exclaims,  "Holy  couple,  shield  me,  rescue  me!" 
and  falls  to  the  ground;  she  is  raised,  when  suddenly 
she  begins  to  cry,  not  in  her  voice,  but  in  the  voice 
of  Hannon:  "Ah!  You  buried  me!  But  I  have 
come  back  to  my  predestined  one,  and  will  never 
leave  her!"  The  company  regard  her  as  a  mad- 
woman, but  the  half-mysterious  figure  of  the  mes- 
senger, who  haunts  the  action  from  beginning  to 
end,  declares  amidst  wild  confusion  that  "a  spirit 
has  entered  the  bride." 

The  possessed  daughter  is  brought  to  the  sage, 
Rabbi  Israel,  upon  whose  powers  Leah's  father 
depends  to  have  the  spirit  exorcised.  During  an 
imposing  scene,  in  which  the  spirit  speaks  through 
the  mouth  of  the  woman  he  has  entered,  the  Rabbi 
concentrates  his  most  intense  will  upon  driving  out 
the  intruder,  but  in  vain.  The  final  resort  is  about 
to  be  brought  into  play, — that  of  excommunication 
— a  drastic  measure  that  requires  the  assent  of  rhc 
town  rabbi.  Consent  is  given,  and  Rabbi  Israel 
(who  is  of  Miropolia)  sends  to  Brinitz  (the  town 
whence  Leah  has  been  brought  to  him)  for  the  bridal 
party,  as  it  is  essential  to  marry  off  Leah  the  mo- 
ment the  dihhuk  has  been  expelled. 

It  happens  that  the  town  rabbi  has  been  visited 
thrice  by  a  dream  in  which  Nissan,  the  departed 
friend  of  Sender,  has  appeared  demanding  justice 
for  a  deep  injury  done  him  by  his  friend.  The  rabbis 
feel  that  the  dream  may  have  a  bearing  upon  the 
recalcitrance  of  the  dibbiik^  and  therefore  decide  to 
submit  the  case  to  a  beth  din — the  rabbinical  trial — 
before  resorting  to  final  measures  in  ridding  Leah 
of  the  spirit.  Accordingly,  the  court-room  is  ar- 
ranged, one  part  being  divided  from  the  rest  by  a 


THE  YIDDISH  DRAMA  431 

white  sheet,  behind  which  the  spirit  of  the  plaintiff, 
Nissan,  comes  to  present  his  case.  Surely  enough, 
the  complaint  of  the  departed  has  a  direct  relation 
to  the  peregrinations  of  the  dibbuk.  Years  before,  it 
transpires,  Nissan  and  Sender,  upon  marrying,  had 
made  a  pact:  should  their  wives  give  birth  at  the 
same  time  to  infants  of  different  sex,  the  children 
should  be  betrothed.  It  so  turned  out  in  the  case 
of  the  children  born,  but  the  vicissitudes  of  life  had 
separated  the  friends,  and  only  coincidence  had 
brought  Hannon,  son  of  Nissan,  to  the  home  of 
Sender,  father  of  Leah,  as  a  poor,  wandering  student. 
Sender,  in  tears,  protests  his  ignorance  of  Hannon's 
identity,  and  begs  the  indulgence  of  the  departed 
Nissan. 

The  verdict  of  the  tribunal  is  as  follows:  Since 
Sender  is  indirectly  guilty  of  Hannon's  death,  he 
must  distribute  half  his  fortune  in  charity  and  for 
the  rest  of  his  life  recite  the  commemorative  prayer 
of  the  dead  (Kaddish)  for  both  Nissan  and  Hannon. 
There  is  no  sign,  however,  that  Nissan  accepts  this 
expiation  or  that  he  forgives  his  friend.  Now  comes 
the  awe-inspiring  scene  in  which  the  dibbuk  is  ex- 
pelled; only  after  two  vain  appeals  does  the  rabbi 
have  recourse  to  the  excommunicatory  ban,  before 
which,  in  the  throes  of  agony,  the  spirit  yields  and 
forthwith  abandons  Leah's  body.  With  it,  life 
seems  to  depart,  for  Leah  sinks  to  the  floor  in  a 
swoon.  Now  has  come  the  moment  to  rush  her 
under  the  wedding  canopy,  but  the  bridal  party  has 
been  delayed  upon  the  road  (more  of  the  spirit's 
work?),  and  when  it  arrives  Leah's  soul  has  flown, 
to  merge  with  that  of  Hannon,  "I  have  forsaken 
your  body,"  he  whispers  to  her,  "but  I  come  to 


432        THE  DRAMA  OF  TRANSITION 

your  soul."  Through  the  wall  appears  his  image, 
in  white,  and  she  goes  to  meet  it.  The  mystic 
chorus  of  the  opening  is  repeated,  and  the  curtain 
falls. 

As  may  be  seen,  even  from  the  outline,  two  sep- 
arate legends,  that  of  the  dibhnk  and   that  of  the 
rabbinical  trial  between  a  dead  man  and  a  living, 
seem    to   have    been    combined    by    the    process   of 
what  earlier  criticism  called  "contamination."     An- 
ski  has  fused  them  into  a  logical  whole,  though  the 
dream   in   which   Nissan   appears   comes   somewhat 
abruptly   into    the    action,    with    little    preparation. 
Relatively  devoid  of  characterization  as  is  the  play, 
lacking  the  personal  contribution  of  the  author,  it 
yet   produces   an   undoubted   effect   of  simple,    vet 
inescapable  power.     The  opening  act  is  notable  for 
its  well-sustained  mystical   atmosphere — an   atmos- 
phere produced  not  by  the  extraneous  aid  of  cheap 
"spiritual"    effects,    but    by    the    glints    of  student 
humor,  the  strands  of  Khassidic  lore  and  conversa- 
tion woven  into  the  fabric  of  the  scene.    So,  too,  the 
second    act— that   of   the    interrupted    wedding,    in 
which   the  haunting  suggestion   of  Hannon's   dead 
grip  upon  the  maiden  is  impressed  with  cumulative 
power.     Yet  there  is  overemphasis  upon  the  moody 
motif.     Compare  this  with  the  remarkable  wedding 
scene  in  Hirschbein's   The  Haunted  Inn,  in   which 
an  even  stronger  mood  is  produced  with  an  artistry 
that  requires  less  emphasis  for  its  effect. 

The  third  act  acquires  its  solemn  character  not 
so  much  from  the  dramatist's  skill  as  from  the  holy 
associations  of  the  scenes.  The  episode  in  which 
the  Rabbi  first  tries  to  expel  the  spirit  of  Hannon 
from  the  body  of  Leah,  and  during  which  the  unruly 


THE  YIDDISH  DRAMA  433 

dibbuk  speaks  through  her  mouth,  is  one  of  the  most 
daring  in  contemporary  drama.  It  is  as  if  Jekyll 
and  Hyde  were  simultaneously  present,  in  opposite 
sexes,  in  the  same  person.  And  what  shall  we  say 
of  the  rabbinical  trial,  in  which,  through  the  mouth 
of  one  of  the  living,  the  dead  man  in  the  shrouded 
enclosure  makes  known  his  plaints  .^^  Der  Dibbuk 
is,  first  of  all,  a  play  of  atmosphere;  like  so  much 
mysticism,  it  is  founded  upon  the  great,  concrete 
reality  of  sex  in  its  most  poetic  evolution — that  of 
an  eternal  love  which  shatters  the  laws  of  both  man 
and  God.  Yet  before  endorsing  this  phase  of  it,  we 
must  remember — and  the  Yiddish  commentators 
seem  to  have  overlooked  the  fact — that  Leah  and 
Hannon  were  not  really  predestined;  they  were  be- 
trothed before  birth,  it  is  true,  but  by  their  parents 
and  not  by  God,  unless  in  their  parents  is  beheld 
the  hand  of  the  Lord. 

Just  how  mystical  is  the  play?  Is  there  any- 
thing in  the  action  that  may  not  possess  its  realistic 
explanation  ?  I  believe  Der  Dibbuk  should  be  sharply 
distinguished  from  those  plays  in  which  the  mys- 
tical element  is  chiefly  poetic  suggestion,  usually  of 
a  watery  sort.  For  cases  similar  to  that  of  the 
dibbuk  under  discussion  are  familiar  to  students  of 
abnormal  psychology;  moreover,  the  sight  of  the 
legendary  lovers'  grave  doubtless  played  its  part 
in  Leah's  obsession;  yet  again,  Khassidim  steeped 
in  their  occult  lore  are  apt  to  work  themselves  into 
a  state  of  self-deception  that  would  lend  the  guise 
of  reality  even  to  a  rabbinical  trial  such  as  is  here 
depicted.  Khassidic  lore  surely  would  seem  to  sup- 
port this  assertion.  So  that  when  Dr.  H.  Shid- 
lovski  terms  An-ski  in  this  play  essentially  a  realist, 


434       THE  DRAMA  OF  TRANSITION 

he  is  not  so  far  astray  as  hasty  consideration  might 
make  him  appear.  It  is  a  subjective  realism,  indeed, 
in  which  reality  is  not  what  lies  without,  but  all  of 
that  which  the  persons  of  the  drama  in  their  daily 
life  accept  as  real,  regardless  of  its  scientific  demon- 
strability. 

Wiener,  in  1899,  questioned  whether  the  Yiddish 
stage  would  last  another  ten  years.  That  was 
twenty-three  years  ago.  Since  that  date  have  been 
written  the  best  dramas  of  the  Jewish  theatre.  The 
prophecy,  however,  was  founded  upon  certain  facts 
of  which  Jewish  writers  themselves  have  not  been 
slow  to  take  cognizance.  Even  though  the  melting- 
pot  should  finally  claim  the  Yiddish  stage  in  this 
country,  the  Yiddish  spirit  will  continue  to  express 
itself  in  the  adopted  tongue,  as  it  has  everywhere 
done;  and  it  will  add  a  distinct  note  to  the  literature 
of  the  United  States,  as  have  the  labors  of  such 
diverse  spirits  as  Abraham  Kahn  in  fiction,  Louis 
Untermeyer  and  a  group  of  others  in  poetry,  Ludwig 
Lewisohn  in  criticism.  To-day,  it  would  seem,  Yid- 
dish literature  is  in  the  midst  of  a  quasi-renaissance. 
Its  future  depends  upon  those  influences  that  will 
force  together  or  disintegrate  the  Jewish  people. 
After  all.  History  has  a  habit  of  poking  fun  at 
prophecies.  What  the  future  holds  had  best  be 
left  to  her. 


RUSSIA 


RUSSIA 

EVREINOV  AND  THE  MONODRAMA 

The  name  of  Nikolai  Evreinov^  is  associated  in 
English  with  the  semi-scandal  that  attended  the 
introduction  of  his  work  to  London.  By  some  he 
was  received  as  a  genius,  by  others  as  a  mounte- 
bank. His  The  Theatre  of  the  Soul,  produced  there 
at  the  Little  Theatre  on  March  8,  191 5,  was  later 
forbidden  performance  at  the  Alhambra,  what 
though  William  Archer  found  the  play  extremely 
original  and  striking  and  Mr.  E.  Spence  called  it 
"a  weird,  clever  piece."  To  make  things  merrier, 
another  damned  it  alliteratively  as  "poor,  puerile, 
and  pretentious,"  yet  one  seeks  in  vain,  in  the 
piece  itself,  reason  for  the  antagonism  it  aroused. 

Thus,  Evreinov's  theory  and  practise  of  the 
"monodrama"  enters  our  dramatic  annals  as  a  sort 
of  intellectual  undesirable,  an  unwelcome  immi- 
grant. It  is  by  no  means  the  least  interesting  of  the 
contemporary  revolts  against  realism,  and  shares 
with  all  the  other  reactions  a  strange  suggestion  of 
the  primitive  amid  its  belligerent  modernity.  And 
the  career  of  its  originator  parallels  his  theory  in 
exotic  piquancy. 

Nikolai  Nikolaievitch  Evreinov  was  born  on  Feb- 

■  In  preparing  this  note  upon  the  provoking  Russian  theorist  and  playwright, 
I  have  used  the  following  books  and  translations  of  Evreinov's  pieces:  (The  name 
of  the  author  is  variously  transliterated  into  English  as  Evreinor,  Evereinov, 
and  Yevreynoff.) 

The  Path  of  the  Russian  Stage,  by  Alexander  Bakshy,  Boston,  1918. 

The  Russian  Theatre  Under  the  Revolution,  by  Oliver  M.  Sayler,  Boston,  1920. 

The  Theatre  of  the  Soul,  translated  by  C.  St.  John  and  Marie  Potapenko. 

A  Merry  Death  and  The  Beautiful  DesPot,  tianslated  by  C.  E.  Bechofer. 

437 


438        THE  DRAMA  OF  TRANSITION 

ruary  13  (26),  1879.  As  a  child  he  was  fascinated 
not  only  by  the  theatre,  composing  his  first  play 
at  the  age  of  seven,  but  by  music,  becoming  expert 
on  the  flute.  Like  Benaventc,  he  has  followed  the 
circus,  whence,  perhaps,  like  the  Spaniard,  he  de- 
rived his  later  fondness  for  presenting  mankind 
upon  the  stage  in  the  guise  of  puppets.  It  is  some- 
thing more  than  chance,  indeed,  that  leads  the  ad- 
vanced theatrical  spirits,  whether  in  Italy,  Spain, 
or  Russia,  to  a  new  age  ot  the  marionette.  He  has 
acted,  he  has  traveled  far  and  near,  fed  early  upon 
the  adventure  tales  of  Mayne  Reid,  whom  he 
emulated  by  writing  his  first  novel  at  the  age  o\ 
thirteen.  Educated  for  the  law  at  the  Imperial 
Law  School,  Petrograd,  he  pursued  his  musical 
studies  under  the  master  colorist,  Rin^.sky-Korsa- 
kofF;  an  atheist  at  fifteen,  a  Nietzschean  at  eighteen, 
at  twenty  he  is  led  to  the  gospels  through  the  death 
of  a  friend. 

From  now  on  his  dramatic  activity  becomes  dom- 
inant, and  in  1908  he  is  chosen  as  successor  to 
Meyerhold  at  the  Kommissharzhevskaya  theatre  in 
Moscow.  The  following  year,  together  with  this 
actress'  brother,  he  organizes  the  Gay  Theatre  for 
Grown-up  Children  in  Petrograd,  producing  there 
The  Merry  Death.  Thence  to  The  Crooked  Looking 
Glass,  which  he  directed  from  1914  to  191 7,  when 
he  left  for  the  Caucasus. 

He  has  been  teacher,  composer,  musician,  and 
even  futurist  painter;  he  has  written  opera  bouffe, 
operetta,  and  what  Mr.  Sayler  calls  a  "lyric  natural- 
istic opera,"  and  as  if  these  interests  were  too  nar- 
row, he  has  added  to  Russian  literature  a  History 
0/  Corpora/  Punishment  in  Russia. 


RUSSIA  439 

At  the  time  of  his  introduction  to  London  he  was 
connected  with  the  Parody  Theatre,  Petrograd,  and 
had  already  written  a  number  of  the  theoretical 
works  propounding  his  invention  of  the  monodrama; 
in  1909  had  appeared  his  Introduction  to  Monodrama^ 
followed  a  year  later  by  The  Representation  of  Love^ 
first  of  the  plays  to  embody  his  new  theory.  In 
191 2  came,  on  the  stage  of  The  Crooked  Looking 
Glass,  the  much-discussed  Theatre  of  the  Soul 
(Sayler  translates  it  The  Greenroom  of  the  Soul). 

"The  full  and  complete  development  of  Evreinov's 
theory  of  monodrama  as  well  as  his  critical  opinion 
of  all  other  forms  of  the  theatre  and  their  apologists 
is  contained  in  the  three  volumes  of  his  greatest 
work  in  diafectic,  Teatr  dlya  Syebya  {The  Theatre 
for  One's  Self)^  the  first  of  which  was  published 
.  .  "":  \h  1915,  the  second  in  1916,  and  the  third 
after  the  Revolution  in  1917.  The  first  volume  is 
characterized  by  the  author  as  theoretical,  the  sec- 
ond as  pragmatical,  and  the  third  as  practical.  For 
its  daring  and  confident  advocacy  of  a  new  way 
of  thinking  in  the  theatre,  for  the  breadth  of  its 
knowledge  of  the  drama  and  the  theatre  in  all 
countries  and  all  times,  for  its  eager  enthusiasm  in 
the  theatre  and  for  its  whimsical  imagination,  it 
is  the  most  important  contribution  to  the  discussion 
of  the  drama  since  Craig  published  On  the  Art  of 
the  Theatre.  No  summary,  no  characterization  can 
do  it  justice."^  And  Sayler  adds  that  among  the 
lan's  books  awaiting  type  are  volumes  upon  Rus- 
sian scenic  setting,  on  portrait  painters,  a  novel, 
jan  aesthetic  treatise,  and  a  third  volume  of  his 
:ollected  plays. 

'  Sayler,  The  Russian  Theatre  Under  the  Revolution,  page  228. 


440        THE  DRAMA  OF  TR.ANSITION 

Among  Evreinov's  exploits  at  the  Parody  Theatre 
was  his  production  of  Shaw's  Candida^  accompanied 
by  the  reading  of  the  stage  directions  by  a  black 
boy,  as  the  Russian  producer  considers  the  direc- 
tions the  most  brilliant  part  of  the  play. 

At  the  same  theatre  he  has  presented  the  first 
act  of  Gogol's  well-known  comedy,  Reviior  {The 
Inspector-General)  in  several  dirterent  styles,  all  in 
the  same  evening.  The  act  was  thus  staged  suc- 
cessively in  the  manner  of  the  Moscow  Art  Theatre, 
after  the  methods  of  Craig,  and  so  forth.  "In  this 
satirical  venture,"  writes  Christopher  St.  John  in 
the  introduction  to  the  translation  of  The  Theatre 
jg/"  the  Soul  made  by  Marie  Potapenko  and  himself, 
"Evreinof  was  hitting  at  the  cranks  who  wantty 
reform  the  theatre  or  make.-  .1  lii'w  iliifiL^  Ulnch  sh.ill 
be  more  artistic  than  the  rluatrc.  He  o^un  the  posj- 
Ltion  ot  being  a  rebel  against  rebels,  aiul  is  no  more 
in  sympathy  with  the  Art  I  hearre,  Moscow,  and 
all  similar  enterprises,  than  wifh  tlu^  ordinarvlTTTTi- 
mercial  theatre."  ' — '' 

-  '1  he   essence   of  Evreinov's    theory   of   the    mon-  / 
odrama,  in  which  JJakshy'   beholds  a  development/ 
of  Meyerhold's  playing  upon  the  imagination  of  the 
audience,   is   the  psychological   fusion^  of  the  spec- 
tator with  the  actor,  and  of  the  stage  with  the  rep- 
resentation of  the  acting  character.     The  play  then  \ 
becomes,  literally,  a  "drama  of  one";  the  actor  is  \ 
the  spectator,  and  the  scene  is  reality,  not  as  it 
appears  to  another,  but  as  it  seems  in  ever-chanjring 
aspect  to  the  actor-spectator  himself.     All  the  char-  ' 
acters   other    than    the    protagonist    are    not    inde- 
pendent  individuals,  as  upon  the  conventional  stage, 

'  The  Path  of  the  Rtissian  Stage,  pages  77-83. 


RUSSIA  441 

but  subjective  entities,  mental  conceptions  of  such 
personages  entertained  by  the  chief  figure.  In  this 
way  Evreinov  hopes  to  concentrate  the  attention 
upon  the  central  actor-spectator.  The  other  type 
of  drama,  which  he  does  not,  by  the  way,  wholly  dis- 
miss, he  calls  "the  drama  alien  to  me"  (i.  e.,  objec- 
tive, capable  of  being  viewed  from  the  outside  by 
a  spectator  who  feels  a  spirit  of  observation  rather 
than  of  participation),  in  contradistinction  to  his 
"my  own  drama"  (i.  e.,  subjective,  impressionistic, 
capable  of  being  felt  from  the  inside  by  a  spectator 
is  the  center  of  the  action.) 
In  connection  with  this  theory  Evreinov  seeks  to 
reduce  the  importance  of  the  spoken  word;  the  ears 
give  way  to  the  eyes,  or,  as  he  has  written,  "we 
hear  more  with  the  eyes  than  with  the  ears;  and 
this,  in  my  opinion,  is  in  the  nature  of  the  theatre/'^ 
In  his  monodrama,  "only  one  acting  character  is 
possible;  in  the  strict  meaning  of  the  word  only  one 
subject  of  action  is  thinkable.  Only  with  him  do  I 
identify  myself,  only  from  his  point  of  view  do  I 
perceive  the  world  surrounding  him,  the  people 
surrounding  him.  In  this  manner  the  latter  must 
present  themselves  through  the  prism  of  the  soul 
of  the  acting  character  himself;  in  other  words,  the 
spectator  of  the  monodrama  perceives  the  other 
participants  in  the  dramas  as  they  are  reflected  in 
the  subject  of  acting,  and,  consequently,  their  living 
experience  having  no  independent  meaning  on  the 
stage,  they  seem  important  only  as  much  as  in  them 
is  projected  the  perceiving  T  of  the  subject  of  the 
action.     On  this  ground,  we  cannot  in  monodrama 

'  "I  wonder  whether  I'm  not  hearing  with  my  eyes?"  (Ich  zweifle,  ob  ich  nicht 
mit  den  Augen  hore),  says  King  Agenor  in  Georg  Kaiser's  Europa,  Act  UI,  as  he 
considers  Zeus's  passionate  dancing. 


442        THE  DRAMA  OF  TRANSITION 

recognize  any  importance  in  the  other  acting  char- 
acters in  the  strict  sense  of  the  word,  and  we  must 
in  justice  set  them  up  as  objects  of  action,  under- 
standing the  word  action  in  the  sense  of  the  percep- 
tion of  them  and  the  relations  of  the  acting  char- 
acter to  them." 

There  is,  in  all  this,  not  a  little  resemblance  to 
the  dream  mechanism  as  elucidated  by  the  psycho- 
logical school  presided  over  by  Freud,  who  is  no 
stranger  to  Evreinov,  In  our  dreams,  stripping 
them  for  the  moment  of  their  condensations,  their 
ravelled  symbolisms,  their  origins  in  recent  impres- 
sions and  obscure  references  to  a  resurgent  past, 
we  witness  just  such  a  monodrama  as  Evreinov  has 
developed.  For  it  is  our  "I"  that  is  at  once  the 
sole  spectator  and  the  sole  actor;  the  other  per- 
sonages of  the  dream  are  surely  not  themselves,  but 
our  perceptions  of  them;  their  words  are  our  own, 
as  are  their  actions;  the  scenery,  which  shifts  far 
more  rapidly  than  ever  it  will  upon  the  most  highly 
developed  stage,  changes  in  place  and  mood  with 
the  altered  tonality  of  thought.  And,  as  if  to  com- 
plete the  analogy,  the  ear  gives  way  to  the  eye. 

We  may  now  consider  The  Theatre  of  the  Soul  in 
the  light  of  the  playwright's  theories;  of  course  all 
the  personages  of  the  cast,  with  the  exception  of 
the  porter  (and  perhaps  he,  too!),  represent  a  differ- 
ent psychological  aspect  of  the  professor  and  of  the 
other  persons  as  they  appear  to  him.  So  that,  in 
the  cast  that  follows  we  have  some  eight  or  nine 
persons  in  one: 

The  Professor. 

M  I,  The  Rational  Entity  of  the  Soul. 

M  2,  The  Emotional  Entity. 


RUSSIA  443 

M  3,  The  Subliminal  Entity. 
M  I's  Concept  Of  the  Wife. 
M  2's  Concept  Of  the  Wife. 
M  3's  Concept  Of  the  W'ife. 
M  2's  Concept  Of  the  Dancer. 
The  Porter. 

The  action  passes  in  the  soul,  in  the  period  of  half 
a  second.  (!)  There  is,  of  course,  a  prologue.  And 
what  a  prologue! 

Picture  the  Professor  appearing  before  a  black- 
board, in  front  of  the  curtain,  chalk  in  hand.  "Ladies 
and  Gentlemen,"  he  begins,  "when  the  unknown 
author  of  The  Theatre  of  the  Soul,  the  play  that  is 
going  to  be  presented  to  you  this  evening,  came  to 
me  some  weeks  ago  with  the  manuscript,  I  confess 
that  the  title  of  his  work  did  not  inspire  me  with 
much  confidence.  'Here,'  I  thought,  *is  another  of 
the  many  little  sensational  plays  with  which  the 
theatre  is  deluged.'  I  was  all  the  more  agreeably 
surprised  to  gather  from  this  first  reading  that 
The  Theatre  of  the  Soul  is  a  genuinely  scientific  work, 
in  every  respect  abreast  with  the  latest  develop- 
ments in  psychophysiology." 

The  Professor  then  invokes  the  names  of  Wundt, 
Freud,  Theophile  Ribot,  and  goes  into  an  obscure 
discussion  of  Fichte's  "entity  of  the  soul."  As  he 
speaks,  he  proceeds  to  draw  a  diagram  upon  the 
blackboard,  in  which  he  represents  the  three  en- 
tities of  himself,  by  the  symbols  M  i,  M  2,  M  3. 
The  first  stands  for  the  rational  entity,  his  reasoning 
self;  the  second,  for  his  emotional  self;  the  third,  for 
his  psychical  self.  And  "these  three  M's,  or  'selves,' " 
constitute   the  great  integral  self.     Whereupon   he 


444        THE  DRAMA  OF  TRANSITION 

writes  down:  "M  i  plus  M  2  piliis  M  3,  equals  M, 
the  entire  personality." 

The  ancients,  he  explains,  believed  that  the  seat 
of  personality  was  placed  in  the  liver.  "But  the 
author  of  the  work  which  is  to  be  presented  to  you 
holds,  and  with  far  better  reason,  I  think,  that  the 
human  soul  manifests  itself  in  that  part  of  the 
physical  breast  which  a  man  instinctively  strikes 
when  he  wishes  to  emphasize  his  good  hiith.  Con- 
sequently the  scene  of  the  human  soul  appears  to 
us  like  this." 

Whereupon  he  draws  a  plan  of  a  large  human 
heart,  with  physiological  comments  as  his  plan  is 
worked  out.  The  system  of  nerves  he  compares  to 
a  telephone,  and  surely  enough  on  the  stage  that  is 
soon  to  be  revealed  to  the  audience,  the  professor's 
plan  is  faithfully  followed  out,  even  to  the  telephone. 
"Such  is  the  scene  in  which  the  'entity  self  plays 
its  part,"  he  concludes.  "But,  ladies  and  gentle- 
men, science  does  not  confine  itself  to  explaining 
things.  It  also  offers  us  consolation.  For  instance, 
it  is  not  enough  to  say:  'I've  done  a  foolish  thing.* 
One  ought  to  know  which  of  the  three  entities  is 
responsible.  If  it  is  M  2,  or  the  emotional  self,  no 
great  harm  is  done.  If  it  is  the  psychical  entity,  the 
matter   need   not   be   taken    very   seriously,   either. 

But  if  it  be  the  rational  self,  it  is  time  to  be  alarmed. 
>> 

What  shall  those  who  object  to  Shaw's  economics- 
dissertation  prefaces  (which,  after  all,  may  be  read 
or  not  as  the  reader  desires) — say  to  this  inescapable 
scientific  prologue?  The  staging  of  the  heart-scene, 
too,  is  a  matter  involving  new  problems  for  the 
modern  theatre. 


RUSSIA  445 

At  the  production  of  this  play  by  Miss  Edith 
Craig's  Pioneer  Players  there  was  used  a  "queer  and 
fascinating  machinery  of  the  simplest  kind,  by  which 
little  was  seen  of  the  three  entities  beyond  their 
faces  appearing  at  different  levels  out  of  intense 
darkness.  The  heart  was  represented  by  a  glowing 
red  space,  which  appeared  to  pulsate,  owing  to  an 
effect  of  light.  The  concepts  of  the  women  were 
seen  in  the  foreground,  and  were  brilliantly  lighted. 

The  play  itself,  outside  of  the  bizarre  conception 
of  a  cast  of  characters  that  represents  the  multiple 
aspects  of  a  single  personality,  and  outside  of  its 
daring  prologue,  calls  for  few  words.  It  depicts,  in 
characteristic  fashion,  the  struggle  going  on  within 
the  heart  of  the  professor  between  his  love  for  his 
wife  and  the  fascination  exercised  over  him  by  the 
dancer.  There  is  a  debate  in  which  his  three  entities 
take  part,  and  in  which  the  various  conceptions  of 
the  different  entities  appear. 

The  end  of  it  all  is  that  the  professor,  in  his  in- 
tense dilemma  (a  dilemma  which  is  all  the  more 
easily  conveyed  to  the  audience  because  of  the  con- 
fusion of  symbols  amidst  which  it  occurs),  shoots 
himself.  A  loud,  cannon-like  report  is  heard,  and  a 
great  hole  opens  in  the  stage-diaphragm,  from  which 
pour  ribbons  of  blood.  Darkness  comes  over  all. 
"M  3  trembles  and  stretches  himself  out  wearily." 
A  porter  carrying  a  lighted  lantern  enters,  cries  out 
"Everyone's  Town,"  and  "M  3"  puts  on  his  hat, 
takes  his  bag,  and  follows  the  porter,  yawning,"^ 

'  The  reasons  for  the  prohibition  of  the  play  at  the  Alhambra  are  a  sort  of 
mystery.  There  is  certainly  nothing  in  the  play  that  a  normal  person  could  call 
immoral.  Indeed  there  was  no  talk  about  the  play's  morality  at  the  time  of  its 
performance  at  the  Little  Theatre.  One  of  the  translators  writes  that  "it  was  re- 
ceived with  indisputable  enthusiasm  by  an  audience  fairly  representative  of  the 
best  elements  in  that  mysterious  entity,  'the  Public'    .    .    ."    He  adds  that  there 


446        THE  DRAMA  OF  TRANSITION 

"Within  the  narrow  limits  of  subjective  illusion- 
ism,"  Bakshy  has  written,  "it  (Evreinov's  theory  of 
the  monodrama)  doubtless  presented  an  original 
development.  There  is,  however^his  fat.il  rnntra- 
diction  concealed  In"  it^  that  whilst  invokin^^  the 
spectator's    power    ofimairination)    in    \vhuli    ir    |^ 

'subjective,  it  is  compcTled  to  base  itsflt  niainly  on 
tTie  realistic  scenic  effects,  suchas  arc  produced  by 

-various  lighting  and  musical  devices  which_inus- 
trate   the^changing  moods   and   standpoinTs  of  the 

^3rotagonist^__jJlls!  rnrrics   illusionism   even    further 


jack  tharTThe  chirpinjT  rrickcfs.  croakin^^  fro^^s.  cur- 
tains blown  by  The  wind,  and  other  mechanic  a  1 
tricks  of  the  Moscow  -^rr  Theatre."  There  is  an 
even  more  fatal  contradiction.  For  the  monodranui, 
as  exhibited  in  The  Theatre  of  the  Soitl^  f.-ip  trom 
creating  the  spiritual,  sub)ecti\-esvn  thesis  of  stagg, 
actor,  and  auditor,  produces  trom  the  start  the  v^y 
opposite  etfect.  The  spectator  is  transformed  into 
a^pupil  before  a  blackboard,  so  that  the  gap  between 
stage  and  auditorium  grows  wider  than  ever;  fie  "is 
asked  to  become  an  analyst,  whereupon  the  syn- 
thetic subjectivism,  even  before  the  play  has  begun, 
is  rendered  impossible.  . 

Of  far  better  stuff  are  The  Mary  Death  (a  har- 
lequinade) and  The  Beautiful  Despot^  which  are  said 
to  be  the  twin  favorites  of  their  author. 

The  personages  of  the  philosophical  harlequinade 
are  the  conventional   types  of  the   Com  media  dell 

was  no  suggestion  whatever  in  the  Press  that  the  play  was  one  which  ought  never 
have  been  brought  "on  the  loftily  moral  English  stage." 

The  license  for  the  Alhambra  porformancp  was  granted,  much  to  the  di.oap- 
pointment  of  the  theatre's  manager,  Mr.  Chariot,  who,  for  reason*  still  unknown, 
had  conceived  a  sudden  and  unwarranted  aversion  to  the  play.  And  yet,  d»^pite 
the  fact  that  untiring  rehearsals  had  been  gone  through  under  the  direction  of 
Miss  Edith  Craig,  Mr.  Chariot,  on  the  very  morning  of  the  day  on  which  the  p»'r- 
formance  was  to  take  place  (the  day  was  designated  "Russia's  Day"),  summarily 
and  without  explanation  refused  to  have  the  play  given  on  his  stage. 


RUSSIA  447 

'x^rte:  Harlequin,  Columbine,  Pierrot;  there  are,  too, 
a  Doctor  and  Death.  To  be  sure,  there  is  nothing 
new  in  the  philosophy,  any  more  than  in  the  figures, 
yet  to  both  the  writer  imparts  a  certain  new  flavor, 
a  modern  savor. 

The  curtain  discovers  Harlequin  asleep.  Pierrot, 
chasing  the  flies  from  the  sleeper's  face,  turns  to 
the  audience  and  commences  a  prologue  that  is  a 
personal  address  to  every  individual  in  the  audience: 

S-h-h-h!  Quiet!  Take  your  seats  quietly  and  try  to 
talk  and  turn  in  your  seats  less.  Even  if  an  ingenuous 
friend  has  dragged  you  in  and  yourselves  are  too  serious 
to  be  interested  in  a  harlequinade,  it's  quite  superfluous 
to  hint  of  it  to  the  public,  which  in  the  main  has  no 
aff'air  with  your  personal  tastes.  Besides,  Harlequin's 
asleep — you  see  him!  S-h-h!  I'll  explain  it  all  to  you 
afterwards.  But  don't  wake  him  up,  please!  And  when 
Columbine  comes  on,  don't  applaud  her  like  mad,  just 
in  order  to  show  that  you  know  her,  had  a  little  intrigue 
with  her,  and  can  appreciate  certain  talents. 

Pierrot  then  explains  that  he  doesn't  fear  any 
intrigue  between  his  wife  Columbine  and  Harlequin; 
yet  his  manner  denotes  the  opposite.  Harlequin, 
moreover,  is  to  die  at  midnight,  and  here  it  is  al- 
ready eight  o'clock!  Suddenly  Pierrot  thinks  of  a 
great  plan:  he  will  push  back  the  hands  of  the  clock 
two  hours!  "I  always  liked  taking  people  in;  but 
when  it's  a  matter  of  taking  in  Death  and  Harle- 
quin at  the  same  time,  and  as  well,  for  the  harm  of 
the  first  and  the  good  of  the  second,  I  don't  think 
you  can  call  this  plan  anything  but  a  stroke  of  genius. 
Well,  to  work!    The  performance  begins!" 

It  quickly  appears  that  Harlequin,  with  the  foot- 
steps of  Death  echoing  in  every  beat  of  the  clock, 


448        THE  DRAMA  OF   1  RAXSITION 

is  determined  to  meet  that  lady  in  most  merry 
mood.  "I  am  Harlequin,"  he  cries,  "and  shall  die 
Harlequin!"  True  to  his  word  he  proceeds  to  make 
merry  with  Pierrot's  Columbine,  even  to  argue  with 
her  about  the  hereafter,  and  when  Death  enters, 
pointing  with  menace  to  the  clock,  he  pokes  fun  at 
the  grim  figure.  "Look  round,"  he  challenges 
Death,  "you  are  in  the  house  of  Harlequin,  where 
one  can  laugh  at  all  that's  tragic,  not  even  exclud- 
ing your  gestures."  He  invites  her  to  perform  the 
traditional  Dance  of  Death,  which  she  does.  A  last 
kiss  to  Columbine,  a  parting  gibe  at  Pierrot's 
cowardice,  and  Harlequin  is  dead. 

Pierrot's  epilogue  is  even  more  impudent  than 
his  prologue: 

I  really  don't  know  what  I  ought  to  bewail  first:  the 
loss  of  Harlequin,  the  loss  of  Columbine,  my  own  bitter 
lot,  or  yours,  dear  audience,  who  have  witnesseil  the 
performance  of  such  an  unserious  author.  And  what 
did  he  want  to  say  in  his  piece? — I  don't  untierstand. 
By  the  way,  I'm  silly,  cowardly  Pierrot,  and  it's  not  for 
me  to  criticize  the  piece  in  which  I  played  an  unenviable 
role.  But  your  astonishment  will  increase  still  more 
when  you  know  what  I've  been  told  to  say  in  conclusion 
by  the  culprit  of  this — well,  between  ourselves — this 
strange  mockery  of  the  public.  S-h-h!  Listen!  "When 
the  genius  Rabelais  was  dying,  the  monks  collected  round 
his  couch  and  tried  in  every  way  to  induce  him  to  do 
penance  for  his  sins.  Rabelais,  in  reply,  only  smiled,  and 
when  the  moment  of  the  end  came  he  said  mockinglv, 
'Let  down  the  curtain;  the  farce  is  over.'  He  said  this 
and  died."  Why  the  graceless  author  thought  it  neces- 
sary to  put  other  people's  words  into  the  mouth  of  one 
of  the  actors,  I  don't  know — I've  not  a  free  hand  in  the 
matter;  but  being  a  respectable  actor,  I  stand  by  him  to 


RUSSIA  449 

the  last  and  so,  obeying  without  dispute  the  will  of  the 
author,  I  shout  mockingly:  "Let  down  the  curtain;  the 
farce  is  over."     {The  curtains  fall  behind  him.) 

But  the  author  reserves  still  another  slap.  For 
the  epilogue  continues  to  speak,  despite  the  fall  of 
the  curtain: 

Ladies  and  gentlemen,  I  forgot  to  tell  you  that  neither 
your  applause  nor  your  hissing  of  the  piece  is  likely  to 
be  taken  seriously  by  the  author,  who  preaches  that 
nothing  in  life  is  to  be  taken  seriously.  And  I  suggest 
that  if  the  truth  is  on  his  side,  then  you  should  hardly 
take  his  play  seriously,  all  the  more  as  Harlequin  has 
probably  risen  from  his  deathbed  already,  and  perhaps 
is  already  tidying  himself  in  anticipation  of  a  call,  be- 
cause, say  what  you  like,  the  actors  can't  be  responsible 
for  the  free-thinking  of  the  author.     {Exit.) 

Now,  this  is  no  mere  tour  deforce  in  physiopsycho- 
logical  analysis,  as  is  The  Theatre  of  the  Soul;  this  is 
philosophic  drama  where  the  philosophy  does  not 
obscure  the  drama.  These  puppets,  like  the  puppets 
of  Benavente  in  The  Bonds  of  Interest^  are  no  prim- 
itive marionettes  strutting  across  the  stage  of  the 
Commedia  dell  'Arte;  they  are  living  modernists, 
making  for  once  out  of  the  banal  eternal  triangle  a 
conception  of  life  as  a  brave  adventure  not  to  be 
taken  too  seriously,  yet  to  be  lived  up  to  the  hilt. 

Jameson  would  have  it  even  more.  To  her  it  is 
"a  technical  masterpiece  and  a  fine  drama,"  and 
"takes  rank  with  the  great  Russian  comedies. 
Evreinov  has  written  no  other  play  which  ap- 
proaches its  standard  of  excellence,  and  his  latest 
work  shows  a  gradual  failing  of  dramatic  power."^ 

'  Modern  Drama  in  Europe,  pages  263,  264. 
29 


450        THE  DRAMA  OF  TRANSITION 

The  sub-title  of  The  Beautiful  Despot  is  The  last 
act  of  a  drama.  If  the  author's  rap  at  the  critics  in 
the  epilogue  of  the  previous  play  reminds  one  of 
Shaw's  episode  of  the  critics  in  Fanny's  First  Play, 
the  leading  figure  in  The  Beautiful  Despot  is  of  a 
piece  with  the  lover  of  the  good  old  days  in  that 
satire.  It  is  not  so  much  a  love  of  the  past  as  a 
scorn  for  the  present,  with  its  withering  commer- 
cialism (which  Evreinov  in  one  place  calls  "Amer- 
icanism") that  drives  the  master  to  become  an  exile 
from  civilization.  He  has  retired  into  the  year  1808, 
surrounding  himself  with  the  books,  the  papers, 
and  the  atmosphere  of  that  age;  thus  he  lives,  as 
he  says,  in  an  attempt  "to  lose  my  despair  in  beau- 
tiful folly." 

So,  when  a  friend  from  the  contemporary  world 
comes  to  visit  the  Master,  the  servants  of  the  house- 
hold and  the  others  are  told  that  they  are  to  pre- 
serve the  illusion  of  1808  before  the  Master's  visit- 
ing friend.  The  friend  arrives,  only  to  be  bewildered 
by  an  entire  household  that  denies  any  knowledge 
of  such  new  matters  as  railroads,  electric  lights,  and 
so  on. 

There  follows  soon  a  most  interesting,  witty,  and 
well-sustained  argument  between  the  Master  and 
his  friend,  in  which  the  past  and  the  present  have 
their  various  claims  for  preference  advanced.  The 
friend  is  almost  seduced  by  the  arguments  for  the 
antique;  he  even  asks  to  be  allowed  to  sleep  at  the 
Master's  that  night,  even  if,  the  next  morning,  he 
intends  to  take  the  quickest  horses  of  the  Master 
to  ride  back  into  the  world  and  the  present. 

It  is,  of  course,  impossible  to  give  plays  like  these 


RUSSIA  451 

their  just  deserts  in  a  mere  outline.  In  distinction 
from  the  thesis-drama,  they  might  be  termed  thesis- 
farce.  And  much  of  the  underlying  thought  in  the 
harlequinade  and  in  this  arraignment  of  the  present 
bears  strong  resemblance.  "What's  health?"  asks 
The  Master  in  the  midst  of  a  maze  of  phrases. 
"Isn't  it  money  to  be  spent  neither  too  stingily  nor 
too  prodigally.''"  .  .  .  Again,  "What!  Hasn't 
the  senselessness  of  existence  stared  you  in  the  face 
yet?"  .  .  .  The  dialogue,  one  should  really  say 
the  monologue,  for  all  is  subordinate  to  the  epigram- 
matic chatter  of  The  Master,  is  the  typical  mockery 
of  the  dramatist.  "The  hour  will  come,"  warns 
that  loquacious  fellow,  "when  the  demon  of  venge- 
ance will  awake  in  you,  the  terrible  demon  of 
vengeance,  and  when  you  will  want  to  seize  the 
globe  like  a  stone  from  the  street  of  the  world  and 
throw  it  with  all  your  force  at  the  great  Policeman." 
A  strain  of  aristocratic  cynicism  runs  through  the 
play.  It  is  hardly  putting  it  too  strong  to  say  that 
what  with  glib  references  to  "the  new  Sakya-Muni" 
and  "the  new  Zarathustra"  and  all  this  ball-tossing 
of  Olympianism,  skepticism  and  the  rest,  this  piece 
will  be  more  read  than  acted.  It  possesses  far  less 
stageworthy  elements  than  The  Merry  Death,  and 
would  seem  to  have  been  meant  for  a  little  theatre 
and  particularly  sympathetic  actors. 

Evreinov's  better  work,  it  would  seem,  is  done 
outside  of  the  monodrama,  to  "which  type  neither 
the  philosophic  harlequinade  nor  the  satire  of  the 
beautiful  despot  belongs.  The  monodrama,  at  best, 
may  prove  successful  pyrotechnics.  Its  essential 
unsuitability   to  drama  of  the  higher  category  is 


452        THE  DRAMA  OF  TR.ANSITION 

that,  though  it  aims  at  synthesis,  it  proceeds  by 
analysis.  It  originates  from  no  center  of  passion 
in  the  author;  it  is  a  product,  and  a  cold  one,  of  the 
intellect.  It  does  not,  in  its  own  creative  life,  ac- 
complish that  fusion  which  it  demands  of  the 
spectator.  It  reveals  thought  rather  than  emotion; 
it  is  scenic  dissection. 

From  the  purely  technical  standpoint  it  proposes 
little  that  is  new.  Marinctri,  in  his  futuristic, 
synthetic  plays,  has  dispensed  with  dialogue  even 
more  than  Evreinov,  and  has,  in  like  manner,  so 
subordinated  the  ear  to  the  eye  that  some  of  his 
pieces  are  meant  only  for  the  eye,  producing  their 
effect  either  by  the  sudden  revelation  of  a  scene 
that  tells  its  own  story,  or  by  manipulation  of  the 
light  to  create,  by  shadows,  the  illusions  of  moving 
objects.  Pirandello,  as  we  have  seen  in  the  chapter 
on  Italy,  has  lately  used  the  monodramatic  idea  in 
conjunction  with  the  regular  type  of  play.  And 
Bakshy  points  out  that  some  of  the  monodrama's 
effects  have  for  a  long  time  been  stock  in  trade  of 
the  moving  picture.' 

Its  chief  interest  to  the  student  of  the  eternal 
ebb  and  flux  of  art  is  that  of  the  frank  invasion  of 
the  stage  by  the  new  psychology.  Like  all  of  the 
theories  that  buzz  in  the  wings  of  the  contemporary 
theatre  it  brings,  at  best,  a  healthy  stir  of  unrest, 
the  contribution  of  a  detail  to  the  complex  craft  of 

'  The  Path  of  the  Russian  Stage,  page  80.  ".  .  .  the  audiences  of  which,  for 
example,  are  treated  to  the  illusion  of  a  moving  motor  car  at  a  standstill,  while 
stationary  houses  appear  to  be  flying  swiftly  into  the  distance.  However,"  he  add*. 
"as  far  as  ray  own  experience  goes  I  have  never,  in  such  circumstanres,  been 
under  the  impression  that  it  was  I  who  was  seated  in  the  car  and  the  hero  of  all  the 
extraordinary  adventures  which  kinema  cars  are  in  the  habit  of  undergoing." 

An  even  better  example  of  monodramatic  suggestion  in  the  "movies"  is  Buster 
Keaton's  "The  Playhouse",  in  which  by  a  photographic  trick  KeatOD  is  made 
literally  "the  whole  show",  portraying  every  character  on  the  ata<e. 


RUSSIA  453 

the  drama.  And  here  is  its  least  attractive  feature: 
this  suggestion  of  a  preoccupation  with  craft  rather 
than  the  passion  that  creates  its  own  form,  becom- 
ing synonymous  with  it.  The  monodrama  is  too 
commentatiously  self-conscious;  it  is,  after  all,  the 
theatre  of  the  soul,  not  the  soul  of  the  theatre. 


THE  UNITED  STATES 


THE  UNITED  STATES 

EUGENE  O'NEILL 

Properly  to  appreciate  the  promise  and  the  per- 
formance of  Eugene  O'Neill  as  one  of  the  youthful 
experimenters  in  the  theatre,  one  has  but  to  have 
gone  through  the  thousands  of  pages  that  his  con- 
temporaries have  written  at  home  and  abroad — 
the  monodramatic  extravagances  of  Evreinov,  the 
lucubrations  of  the  Italian  "grotesquers,"  the  mad 
confusion  of  half  of  the  German  Expressionists.  To 
talk  of  "placing"  O'Neill  at  this  early  date  would 
be  the  worst  of  academic  fatuousness;  his  work  is 
plentiful,  widely  varying  in  quality,  and  his  attitude, 
perhaps,  as  his  production,  is,  of  choice,  experimental 
rather  than  settled.  Seemingly  he  marks  a  new  era 
in  the  drama  of  the  United  States;  what  one  may  do 
now  is  to  examine,  at  the  beginning  of  that  career, 
the  qualities  and  the  works  of  which  it  is  com- 
pounded, following  it  from  the  worst  of  melodrama  to 
the  best  of  realism,  and  thence  to  a  freedom  of 
structure  that  approaches  Expressionism  only  in  its  ^ 
disruption  of  conventional  form.  For,  thus  far  at 
least,  O'Neill  has  yielded  to  neither  the  formlessness 
nor  the  incoherence  of  the  more  extreme  Expres- 
sionists; even  when  his  contact  with  external  reality 
seems  least  firm,  he  yet  maintains  his  grip  upon  the 
roots  of  things.  There  are,  in  The  Emperor  Jones, 
for  instance,  elements  of  the  monodrama,  yet 
O'Neill  never  becomes  metaphysically  abstruse  as 

457 


458        THE  DRAMA  OF   1  RAXSITION 

Evreinov;  his  The  Hairy  Ape  may  suggest  the  later 
Kaiser  and  the  youthful  Hasenclever,  but  it  is  not 
of  the  self-willed,  esoteric  brood  that  is  signalized 
by  the  misty  productions  of  Oskar  Kokoschka  and 
his  fellow-Germans.  In  this,  the  toreign  critic,  who 
has  his  labels  as  have  our  own,  may  be  inclined  to 
find  a  Yankee  tendency  to  stick  to  facts  and  not  fly 
too  easily  off  on  the  wings  of  fancy  or  the  back  of  a 
Pegasus  who  has  broken  the  reins  of  the  imagina- 
tion and  ranges  wildly  through  stellar  space.  I 
rather  find  it  in  the  man's  own  personality,  in  an 
elemental  vigor  that  sees  even  phantoms  clearly. 
For  it  is  one  of  O'Neill's  distinguishing  traits  that 
he  lends  a  peculiar  vitality  even  to  his  worst  scenes 
— and  there  are  bad  ones  even  in  his  later  pro- 
ductions.* 

To  IVIr.  Kenneth  Macgowan  (see  yauity  Fair  for 
April,  1922)  I  am  indebted  for  a  full  list  of  O'Neill's 
plays,  written  during  the  past  nine  years.  .Ar- 
ranged chronologically,  they  are  as  follows: 

1913:  /^  Wije  for  a  Life — one  act,  destroyed.  The  Web 
— one  act,  published  1914  with  four  succeeding  plays. 
Thirst — one  act.  191 4:  Recklessness — one  act.  Warn- 
ings— one  act.  Fog — one  act.  Bread  and  Butter — four 
acts,  destroyed.  Servitude — three  acts,  destroyed.  Bound 
East  Jor  Cardiff — one  act.  Abortion — one  act,  destroyed. 
191 5:  A  Knock  at  the  Door — one-act  comedy,  destroyed. 
The  Sniper — one  act,  produced  by  Provincctown  Players 
(1917),  destroyed.  The  Personal  Equation — four  acts, 
destroyed.  Belshazzar — Bibiical  play  in  six  scenes,  de- 
stroyed. 191 6:  Before  Breakfast— ont  act.  The  Movie 
Man — one-act  comedy,  destroyed.     Now  I  Ask   You — 

'In  the  case  of  O'Neill  I  assume,  of  course,  a  knowlcdfje  of  his  latest  piec«« 
which  are  readUy  accessible  in  print,  if  not  on  the  stage.  All  but  the  first  of  the 
volumes  {.Thirst  and  Other  One-Act  Plays,  Boston,  1914)  are  published  in  New 
York.    A  special  edition  of  The  Emperor  Jones  is  issued  in  Cincinnatf 


THE  UNITED   STATES  459 

three-act  farce-comedy,  destroyed.  Atrocity — one-act  pan- 
tomime, destroyed.  19 17:  He — one  act.  In  the  Zone — 
one  act.  The  Long  Voyage  Home — one  act.  The  Moon  oj 
the  Caribbees — one  act.  The  G.  A.  N. — one-act  farce- 
comedy,  destroyed.  191 8:  Till  We  Meet — one  act,  de- 
stroyed. The  Rope — one  act.  Beyond  the  Horizon — three 
acts,  6  scenes,  produced  1920.  The  Dreamy  Kid — one  act. 
Shell-Shock — one  act,  destroyed.  Where  the  Cross  Is 
Made — one  act.  The  Straw — three  acts,  five  scenes,  pro- 
duced 1 92 1.  1 91 9:  Honor  Among  the  Bradley s — one  act, 
destroyed.  Chris — three  acts,  six  scenes,  produced  out 
of  town  1920,  destroyed.  The  Trumpet — one-act  comedy, 
destroyed.  Exorcism — one  act,  produced  1920,  destroyed. 
1920:  Gold — four  acts,  produced  1921.  Anna  Christie — 
four  acts,  produced  1921.  The  Emperor  Jones — eight 
scenes,  produced  1920.  Different — two  acts,  produced 
1920.  1 92 1:  The  First  Man — four  acts.  The  Fountain — 
prologue  and  nine  scenes.     The  Hairy  Ape — eight  scenes. 

In  his  very  first  published  work  appear,  in  the 
rough,  both  the  good  qualities  and  the  bad  that  are 
to  haunt  his  later  plays.  For  the  light  they  throw 
upon  the  maturer  artist,  they  repay  something  more 
than  cursory  examination.  Thirst  and  Other  One- 
Act  Plays  comprises  Thirsty  The  IVeb,  Warnings^ 
Fog^  and  Recklessness. 

The  Web  is  melodrama  at  its  worst,  with  all  the 
outworn  technique  connoted  by  the  name,  but  al- 
ready there  appears,  in  the  sound  of  Rose's  coughing 
as  she  is  led  away  by  the  officers,  O'Neill's  predilec- 
tion for  the  potency  of  pure  sound  upon  the  stage. 
Time  and  again  this  fondness  for  aural  effects  is 
evident;  in  the  remaining  plays  of  the  volume,  for 
example,  there  is  the  whining  of  the  wireless  in 
Warnings^  the  steamer  whistles  and  the  dripping 
water  of  the  icebergs  in  Fog;  there  are,  in  The  Web 


460       THE  DRAMA  OF  TRANSITION 

itself,  the  falling  raindrops.  So,  in  the  later  Bound 
East  for  Cardif,  there  is  the  whistle  bhnving  through 
the  fog  at  intervals  of  a  minute  and,  in  The  Emperor 
Jones^  the  haunting  crescendo  of  the  tom-tom,  beat- 
ing faster  and  faster  with  the  wild  palpitation  of 
terror. 

Recklessness,  like  The  IVeb,  has  all  the  earmarks  of 
melodrama:  the  spying  maid,  the  lying  mistress, 
the  treacherous  chauffeur,  the  purloined  letter  prov- 
ing the  wife's  guilt,  the  husband's  cruel  and  sar- 
donic revenge.  Warnings,  the  tale  of  a  deal  wireless 
operator  who  fails  to  receive  the  message  warning 
of  a  derelict,  and  who  commits  suicide  on  learning 
that  the  fault  is  his,  requires  two  scenes  for  its 
setting;  the  first  would  not  have  been  necessary  in 
the  hands  of  a  dramatist  more  skilled  than  was 
O'Neill  at  the  time;  the  second  scene  is  better  done 
and  is  in  the  nature  of  a  foretaste  of  the  later  work. 
Fog  is  the  tale  of  vet  another  wreck,  brought  about 
by  a  collision  with  an  iceberg.  Best  ot  the  collec- 
tion, easily,  is  Thirst,  for  the  depiction  of  the  raving, 
wrecked  trio  afloat  on  a  boundless  ocean  with  a  raft 
for  their  world  is  accomplished  with  tnie  psycho- 
logical power,  vivid  scenic  sense,  and  a  flair  for  the 
abnormal  passages  in  the  lives  of  men  and  women. 
One  thinks  of  this  playlet  as  he  reads  the  opening 
act  of  Gold, 

What  the  earth  was  to  Antseus,  the  sea  is  to 
O'Neill  in  these  early  plays.  He  gathers  strength 
from  each  new  contact.  On  land,  in  these  same 
products  of  his  'prentice  days,  he  fairly  wobbles 
like  a  sailor  on  shore  leave  after  months  and  months 
on  the  deep.  To  be  sure,  the  dialogue  as  often  as 
not   is   a  string  of  cliches;   the   characterization   is 


THE  UNITED   STATES  461 

uncertain;  but  even  thus  early  we  have  a  welcome 
infusion  of  the  exotic  element,  a  groping  after  the 
inscrutable  powers  that  rule  over  land  and  sea,  a 
vigorousness,  a  masculinity,  whose  muscles  were 
strong  with  a  strength  that  lacked  direction  and 
discipline. 

"But  the  blind  sky  will  not  answer  your  appeals 
or  mine,"  says  the  Gentleman  in  Thirst.  "Nor  will 
the  cruel  sea  grow  merciful  for  any  prayer  of  ours." 
Already,  in  the  cannibalism  of  the  negro,  resurgent 
through  the  ravages  of  thirst,  there  is  prefigured 
the  regression,  through  fear,  of  the  burly  Emperor 
Jones — a  psychological  retracing  that,  by  the  way, 
was  accomplished  for  the  group  in  In  the  Zone^  as 
The  Emperor  Jones  accomplishes  it  for  the  indi- 
vidual. Already,  in  Fog^  O'Neill,  like  the  Dark 
Man  of  his  play,  finds  the  people  in  the  steerage 
more  interesting  to  talk  to  than  the  second-class 
passengers;  the  suggestion  of  a  mysterious  grinding 
power  does  not  harmonize  with  the  realism  of  the 
scene,  any  more  than  does  the  philosophical  argu- 
ment between  the  poet  and  the  business  man,  but 
one  may  glimpse  here  the  original  suggestion  of 
The  Hairy  Ape.  In  The  Web.,  O'Neill  had  spoken, 
in  a  stage  direction,  of  an  "ironic  life-force";  in  Fog 
there  is  talk  of  "poverty — the  most  prevalent  of  all 
diseases."  By  which  tokens  he  had  levied  tiny 
tribute  upon  Shaw. 

Intrinsically,  these  early  pieces  are  of  meager 
worth;  they  are,  however,  necessary  to  a  fuller  under- 
standing of  the  man,  containing,  as  they  do,  the 
suggestions  of  a  number  of  his  later  plays. 

The  Moon  of  the  Caribbees  and  Six  Other  Plays  of 
the  Sea.,  though  published  five  years  later  than  the 


462        THE  DRAMA  OP^  TRANSITION 

little  volume  we  have  just  considered,  contains 
plays  written  between  1917  and  1919.  The  melo- 
dramatic element,  though  refined,  is  still  there;  by 
now,  however,  O'Neill  seems  to  have  acquired  a 
genuinely  philosophic  grasp  upon  his  material. 
Before,  he  was  outside  his  imaginary  world,  now  he 
has  broken  in.  Before,  he  revealed  no  firm  grasp 
upon  character;  now  he  is  able  to  create  a  little 
human  comedy  of  the  sea,  in  which  the  same  per- 
sonages, clearly  differentiated,  appear  in  the  various 
plays  and  are  readily  recognized  for  the  distinct 
men  they  are.  The  Moou  of  the  Caribbees  has  color, 
mood,  suggestion,  action;  Bound  East  for  Cardif 
has  all  these,  and  a  simple  pathos  that  is  the  voice 
of  a  whole  philosophy.  "This  sailor  life  ain't  much 
to  cry  about  leavin',"  says  a  dying  comrade  to  his 
mate.  "...  Just  one  ship  after  another,  hard 
work,  small  pay  and  bum  gnib;  and  when  we  git  into 
port,  just  a  drink  endin'  up  in  a  fight,  and  all  your 
money  gone,  and  then,  ship  away  again.  Never 
meetin'  no  nice  people;  never  gittin'  outa  sailor 
town,  hardly  in  any  port;  traveUin'  all  over  the 
world  and  never  seein'  none  of  it;  without  no  one 
to  care  whether  you're  alive  or  dead.  .  .  .  There 
ain't  much  in  all  that  that'd  make  yuh  sorry  to 
lose  it,  Drisc."  No  pretty  language  there;  no  ro- 
manticizing of  the  heaving  billows  and  a  life  on  the 
ocean  wave;  no  stage  rhetoric.  This  is  the  tongue 
of  reality,  with  the  clear-sightedness  of  actual  con- 
tact. It  is  the  language  that  The  Hairy  Ape  is  to 
speak,  in  harsher  tones,  down  in  his  hole  at  the  bot- 
tom of  the  ship  which  is  the  bottom  of  civilization 
as  well.  Not  so  good  is  The  Long  Voyage  Home, 
with  its  tale  of  Olson  of  the  Glencairn  shanghaied 


THE  UNITED   STATES  463 

in  a  London  dive  just  as  he  is  on  his  way  home  to 
a  farm,  after  giving  up  sailoring  for  good.  This 
melodrama  of  types,  with  its  seduction,  poisoned 
drink,  robbery,  and  other  familiar  devices,  is  saved 
only  by  a  tinge  of  irony,  and  only  for  a  while.  Of 
better  stuff  is  In  the  Zone,  with  its  war-scarred  crew 
in  the  mine  zone  suspecting  the  lovelorn  Smitty 
of  harboring  a  treacherous  bomb  in  the  box  that 
treasures  his  harmless  love  letters.  lie  inclines  to 
melodrama,  but  is  strengthened  by  its  revelation 
of  man's  search  for  power  in  the  face  of  woman's 
weakening  love,  while  both  Where  the  Cross  Is  Made 
and  The  Rope  are  spoiled  by  the  author's  unwilling- 
ness to  forego  the  assistance  of  convention  and  co- 
incidence. Else,  why  these  foreclosed  mortages, 
these  wills,  this  plentiful  passing  of  information 
across  the  footlights,  these  maundering  soliloquies? 
Yet  there  is  vision  in  Where  the  Cross  Is  Made,  as 
the  fulfilment  of  the  theme  in  Gold  has  revealed. 
And,  for  that  matter,  is  not  the  theme  of  He  deeply 
akin  to  the  struggle  between  man  and  wife  in  the 
selfsame  Gold? 

Beyond  the  Horizon,  written  in  191 8,  is  the  first 
of  the  author's  longer  plays  to  survive  his  destructive 
wrath.  Even  here,  where  the  domestic  tragedy  is 
enacted  upon  the  land,  the  roar  of  the  sea  is  heard 
in  'the  distance.  Though  the  ever-present  sea  is 
oftener  than  not  the  "ol'  davil"  that  Chris  Christo- 
pherson  is  always  calling  it  in  Anna  Christie,  it  yet 
may  heal,  as  it  does  Anna  herself,  so  long  shielded 
from  it  by  her  obsessed  parent.  To  Robert  in 
Beyond  the  Horizon,  as  to  Anna  of  the  later  play, 
the  land  proves  a  curse;  but  the  sea  that  heals  Anna 
is  kept  by  the  irony  of  fate  from  Robert,  whom  it 


464        THE  DRAMA  OF  TR.ANSITION 

would  have  cured  doubly,  by  taking  him  from  Ruth, 
who  was  not  made  for  him,  and  by  bringing  him 
the  romance  that  his  poetic  nature  craved.  At  the 
end  Robert  speaks  to  his  returned  brother,  Andrew, 
with  the  clear  vision  of  the  dying.  He  asks  him  to 
take  care  of  Ruth,  whom  Andrew  and  not  Robert 
should  have  married  in  the  first  place,  and  of  the 
land,  which  Andrew  and  not  Robert  should  havT 
remained  to  till.  "You've  spent  eight  years  running 
away  from  yourself.  Do  you  see  what  I  mean? 
You  used  to  be  a  creator  when  you  loved  the  farm. 
You  and  life  were  in  harmonious  partnership.  And 
now — {He  stops  as  if  seeking  vainly  for  words.) 
My  brain  is  muddled.  But  part  of  what  I  mean  is 
that  your  gambling  with  the  thing  you  used  to  love 
to  create  proves  how  far  astray  you've  gotten  from 
the  truth.  So  you'll  be  punished.  You'll  have  to 
suffer  to  win  back — ". 

The  play  was  hailed,  upon  its  initial  performance, 
as  one  of  the  master  products  of  realism  in  the 
United  States;  O'Neill,  who  must  since  have  dis- 
concerted the  ready  prophecies  of  our  pigeon-hole 
critics  with  his  experiments  in  the  new  forms,  was 
looked  upon  as  the  founder  of  a  truly  realistic  drama. 
Yet  from  the  standpoint  of  such  a  realism  he  has 
carried  over,  into  the  play,  some  of  the  less  worthy 
devices  of  his  early  pieces.  His  dialogue  is  natural 
enough,  the  writing  is  well-modulated,  there  are 
high  moments,  and  one  feels  something  like  an 
implacable  fate  hovering  over  these  toys  of  the  land 
and  the  sea.  This  is  a  domestic  tragedy  of  might- 
have-been,  permeated  with  that  "ironic  life-force" 
of  which  the  'prentice  O'Neill  had  written.  But  to 
overpraise  the  play  and  the  author  in  one's  enthu- 


THE  UNITED   STATES  465 

siasm  at  our  drama's  final  attainment  of  adulthood, 
is  to  be  false  to  both.  "O'Neill's  future,"  Mr. 
Macgowan  has  written,  "lies  along  the  new  way 
and  he  must  follow  it."^  Nor  is  this  mere  partizan- 
ship  of  the  new  for  novelty's  sake.  Realism,  in  the 
catalogue  sense  of  the  word,  holds  for  O'Neill  the 
traps  of  melodrama,  of  the  artistically  purposeless 
goings  and  comings  of  the  dramatist's  puppets. 
This  appears  in  so  good  a  play  as  Beyond  the  Horizon^ 
in  which  Andrew,  each  time  that  he  comes  on  a 
visit  to  the  old  farm,  wishes  to  return  at  once  to 
his  distant  business,  the  reason  for  this  impatience 
being  more  the  playwright's  than  the  character's. 
It  appears  in  Anna  Christie^  where  her  future  lover, 
though  he  has  been  five  days  adrift  with  his  ship- 
wrecked companions,  rowing  them  to  safety,  must 
begin  to  make  love  to  her  no  sooner  than  he  has 
been  picked  out  of  the  water.  It  appears  later  in 
the  play,  in  the  inexcusable  fourth  act,  wherein  the 
author  kicks  his  dramatic  and  artistic  structure  to 
bits  by  a  sudden  reversal  of  the  situation.  It  ap- 
pears, in  a  peculiar  manner,  in  Difrent,  by  not 
appearing  at  all,  so  to  speak.  For  Different  is  by 
implication  a  psychological  contrast,  yet  the  author 
presents  only  the  outer  ends  of  that  contrast,  with 
thirty  years  between  the  acts.  The  missing  act, 
the  one  he  did  not  write,  was  precisely  that  in  which 
some  hint  of  the  process  which  changed  the  woman 
from  a  prim  Sunday-school  mistress  to  a  silly 
flapper  of  fifty  should  have  been  presented. 

'  Vanity  Fair,  April,  1922,  page  16d.  If  I  concur  in  Macgowan's  opinion, 
it  is  not  through  definite  allegiance  to  the  new  way  as  against  the  old.  The  worthy 
playwright  transcends  the  limitations  of  any  particular  form,  and  the  special  form 
of  a  play  is  determined  by  the  material  as  it  shapes  itself  in  the  author's  imagina- 
tion, and  by  nothing  else.  That  form  is  part  of  the  matter, — an  aspect  of  it. 
O'Neill's  outlook  upon  the  world  is  a  peculiar  blend  of  vivid  insight  and  spiritual 
groping;  it  violates  itself  in  the  moulds  of  ordinary  realism,  as  I  try  to  show. 
30 


466        THE  DRAMA  OF  TRANSITION 

Had  O'Neill,  for  example,  treated  The  Emperor 
Jones  (produced  in  1920)  in  the  fashion  of  conven- 
tional realism — and  there  was,  one  may  imagine, 
that  possibility — he  would  have  fallen  short  of  a 
veritable  triumph,  not  through  the  accidental  use 
of  an  inappropriate  technique  so  much  as  through 
failure  to  grasp  the  essence  of  his  theme,  which 
demanded  the  form — which  vcas  the  form  itself — 
that  he  employed.  The  Emperor,  not  to  be  slayed 
except  by  a  silver  bullet,  is  killed  by  just  such  a 
bullet  moulded  by  his  credulous  vassals.  So,  too, 
are  we  slain  by  the  very  belief  of  others  in  our 
own  deceptions.  Here  we  have  a  masterly  presenta- 
tion of  the  degenerative  process  of  fear.  The  Em- 
peror, once  he  has  fled  the  palace — the  first  step  in 
his  fear,  despite  all  his  bluster,  which  was  a  sign  of 
fear  in  the  first  place — wanders  through  the 
forest  in  rapid  regression  to  primitivity.  The  tom- 
tom effect  is  remarkable,  and  is  the  culmination  of 
O'Neill's  natural  response  to  such  sensory  stimuli. 
This  is  no  mere  sound  accessory,  as  it  is  in  the  early 
plays,  with  their  fog  whistles,  their  rain  drops, 
their  whining  children,  and  the  whirr  of  the  wire- 
less. The  tom-tom  is  part  and  parcel  of  the  psycho- 
logical action;  at  first  it  is  the  call  to  war;  then  it 
merges  into  the  Emperor  Jones's  vision  of  the  slaves 
rolling  to  its  beat;  finally  it  becomes  his  own  throb- 
bing, feverish  temples,  and  all  the  while  it  is  our 
heart  beating  more  and  more  rapidly  as  we  follow 
his  fate. 

Is  the  play  one  long  soliloquy,  practically?  But 
fear  talks  much  to  itself.  The  visions  that  rise  be- 
fore his  eyes.''  They  are  such  as  fear  beholds,  and 
truer   to   genuine   reality   than   would   be   a   blank 


THE  UNITED   STATES  467 

stage.  It  is  the  surge  of  the  Emperor's  speech  that 
makes  these  spectres  live  for  us  as  they  do  for  him. 
This  part  of  the  play  is  really  of  a  piece  with  the 
monodrama,  in  that  it  achieves  complete  identifica- 
tion of  the  auditor  with  the  actor,  and  presents 
surrounding  reality  not  as  it  appears  to  those  out- 
side the  action,  but  in  subjective  terms  of  the  actor's 
self.  There  are  hints  of  the  cinema  in  the  gradual 
unfolding  of  the  past  as  the  play  progresses — a 
series  of  "flash-backs,"  as  it  were;  but  this  is  no 
mere  imitation  of  a  medium;  it  is  inherent  in  the 
character  of  the  play;  it  is  the  play,  and  could  not 
have  been  presented  otherwise.  Here  symbol  and 
psychology  merge;  analysts  have  found  it  a  remark- 
able study,  fundamentally  as  true  of  the  white  man 
as  of  the  black;  the  Emperor  Jones  is,  in  addition, 
or  simultaneously,  an  unobtrusive  symbol  of  man's 
vain  boast  of  power. 

Anna  Christie^  written  in  1920,  just  before  The 
Emperor  Jones^  was  produced  a  year  later.  For 
three  acts  it  presents  another  realistic  study  in  the 
"ironic  life-force";  the  fourth,  as  we  have  said  al- 
ready, is  inexcusable,  except  upon  the  frankly  com- 
mercial desire  to  provide  a  happy  ending  at  what- 
ever cost  to  the  artistic  conscience.  If  Mr.  O'Neill 
really  believes  in  that  final  act,  the  three  preceding 
ones,  with  their  closely- woven  narrative,  their 
pungent  dialogue,  their  reality  to  the  life  they  por- 
tray, must  be  a  lucky  accident.  And  one  refuses  to 
believe  in  such  fortunate  fortuities.  Not  from  the 
man  who  has  written  the  relentless  scenes  of  The  First 
Man,  in  which  the  creative  soul  that  is  the  artist 
may  tread  even  upon  the  creative  body  that  is 
woman. 


468        THE  DRAMA  OF  TRAV^ITIOV 

And  so,   from   melodrama   and  external   realism, 
through  the  novelty  of  T/if  Fjnpcror  Jones ^  wc  come 
to   the  newest  ot  O'NeiU's   productions,    The  Hairy 
Apey  a  "comedy  of  ancient  and  modern  life."    The 
ancient  life  of  the  authf)r's  sub-title   is   that  same 
ancient  lite  which  sprang  into  being  in  the  successive 
downward  steps  of  the  Emperor  Jones's  terror,  for 
in   theme   and  scene    The  Hairy  Jpe  is  contcm[v>- 
raneous  with  the  transatlantic  steamship  on  which 
it    takes    place,    at   once    realistic    background    and 
symbolic,    timeless    token    of   ca.ste    and    character. 
"The  beginnings  of  it,"  wrote  Mr.  Woollcott  in  The 
New  York  Times  on  the  day  (April   i6,  1922)  pre- 
ceding   its    initial     production     at     the     Plymouth 
Theatre,  whither  it  hat!  nioveil  from  the  Macdougal 
Street  home  of  the  Provincetown  Players,  "can  be 
traced  back  to  the  days  ten  or  eleven  years  agr)  when 
O'Neill  was  an  able  seaman  aboard  one  of  tKe  ships 
of  the  American  Line  and  came  to  know  a  certain 
stoker  on   the  same  ship— a  huge   Livcrpof)l   Irish- 
man, who  drank  enormously,  relished  nothing  in  all 
the  world  so  much  as  a  good  kn(Kk-down-and-drag- 
out  fight,  and  who  had  a  mighty  pride  in  his  own 
strength,  a  pride  that  glorictl  in   the  heat  and  ex- 
haustion  of  the   stokehold    which    would   drop   the 
weaklings  and  leave  him  roaring  with  mirth  at  the 
sight  of  them  carried  out.     He  was  just  such  a  spec- 
imen, therefore,  as  the  Yank  Smith  on  whose  im- 
mense shoulders  the  ominous,  nightmare  events  of 
The  Hairy  Ape  press  down  like  the  crowding  phan- 
toms in  some  fantastic  picture  of  Despair. 

"In  the  mutual  snobbery  of  the  liner,  O'Neill  as 
a  seaman  could  hardly  exchange  confidences  with 
the  stoker,  but  they  got  to  know  each  other  ashore 


THE  UNITED   STATES  469 

in  the  greater  democracy  of  Johnny  the  Priest's 
saloon  down  in  Fulton  Street  just  around  the  corner 
from  West — the  same  saloon,  probably,  through 
whose  grimy  windows  the  light  filtered  on  the  gaudy 
hair  and  cheerless  face  of  Anna  Christie.  There, 
over  his  beer,  O'Neill  was  free  to  contemplate  the 
immense  complacency  of  the  Irishman  and  his  glow- 
ing satisfaction  with  what  most  folks  would  have 
regarded  as  an  unenviable  role  in  the  world.  The 
memory  of  that  satisfaction  furnished  a  curious 
background  for  the  news  which  drifted  up  from  the 
waterfront  some  years  later — the  tidings  that  one 
night,  when  the  ship  was  plowing  along  in  mid- 
Atlantic,  the  big  stoker  had  stolen  up  on  deck  and 
jumped  overboard.  Why?  What  had  happened  to 
shake  that  Gargantuan  contentment?  What  had 
broken  in  and  so  disturbed  a  vast  satisfaction  with 
the  world  that  the  big  fellow  had  been  moved  to 
leave  it?  O'Neill  never  heard  if  any  one  knew,  but 
out  of  his  own  speculation  there  took  shape  at  last 
the  play  called  The  Hairy  Ape.'' 

The  Emperor  Jones  emphasized  the  individual's 
regression  through  fear;  The  Hairy  Ape  shows  that 
same  individual  thwarted  in  his  gropings  after  social 
significance,  returning  in  his  inarticulate  rage  to  his 
savage  ancestor  of  the  forest.  The  "ironic  life- 
force"  again,  tinged  with  a  distinctly  social  meaning 
and  attitude.  As  the  Emperor,  blustering  in  his 
consciousness  of  power  before  the  fear  connoted  in 
his  blustering  begins  to  get  the  better  of  him,  so 
Yank  the  coal-heaver,  bellowing  his  pride  of  posi- 
tion in  the  infernal  heat  of  the  stokehole — a  pride, 
already  from  the  first,  instinct  with  the  uncertainty 
of  all  exaggerated  pride,  already  betraying  the  in- 


470        THE  DRAMA  OF  TRANSITION 

evitable  result  when  stokehole  clashes  with  upper 
deck  in  the  vision  of  a  curious  daughter  of  the  rich, 
who  would  go  a-slumming  on  the  transatlantic  and 
get  a  glimpse  of  life  below  decks. 

Listen  to  the  bluster  of  the  hairy  ape,  Yank: 

Hell,  sure!  Dat's  my  favorite  climate.  I  eat  it  up! 
It's  me  makes  it  roar.  It's  me  makes  it  move.  Sure, 
on'y  for  me  everything  stops.  It  all  goes  dead,  get  me! 
De  noise  and  smoke  and  all  de  engines  movin*  de  woild, 
dey  stop.  Dere  ain't  nothin'  no  more!  Dat's  what  I'm 
sayin'.  Everything  else  dat  makes  de  woild  move,  somcp'n 
makes  it  move.  It  can't  move  without  somp'n  else,  see? 
Den  yuh  get  down  to  me.  I'm  at  the  bottom,  get  mc? 
Dere  ain't  nothin'  foither.  I'm  de  end.  I'm  de  start! 
I  start  somp'n  and  de  woild  moves.  It — dat's  me!  De 
new  dat's  moidern  de  old.  I'm  de  ting  in  coal  dat  makes 
it  boin;  I'm  steam  and  oil  for  de  engines;  I'm  de  ting  in 
noise  dat  makes  you  hear  it;  I'm  smoke  and  express  trains 
and  steamers  and  factory  whistles;  I'm  de  ting  in  gold 
dat  makes  it  money!  .And  I'm  what  makes  iron  into 
steel!  Steel,  dat  stands  for  de  whole  ting!  And  I'm  steel 
— steel — steel!  I'm  de  muscle  in  steel,  de  punch  behind 
it!  {As  he  says  ihis  he  pounds  with  his  fist  against  the  steel 
bunk.  All  the  men,  roused  to  a  pitch  of  frenzied  self-glorifi- 
cation by  his  speech,  do  likewise.  There  is  a  deafening 
metallic  roar  through  which  Yank's  voice  can  be  heard 
bellowing.)  Slaves,  hell!  We  run  de  whole  woiks.  We're 
it,  get  me!  All  de  rich  guys  dat  tink  dey're  somep'n,  dey 
ain't  nothin'!  Dey  don't  belong.  But  us  guys,  we're 
in  de  move,  we're  at  de  bottom,  de  whole  ting  is  us,  see? 
We  belong! 

But  "belong"  is  precisely  what  Yank  does  not, 
and  the  eight  scenes  that  comprise  the  play  spell 
his  disillusionment,  until  he  meets  a  grisly  end  in 
the  arms  of  a  gorilla  at  the  zoo.  Ape  has  come  back 
to  ape. 


THE  UNITED   STATES  471 

It  is  The  Hairy  Ape  and  The  Emperor  Jones  that 
are  the  cause  of  the  linking  of  O'Neill  with  the 
German  Expressionists.  But,  as  we  have  seen,  the 
resemblance  is  by  no  means  identity.  He  shares 
their  speed  technique,  but  not  the  telescoping  of 
time  and  space  that  is  practised  by  the  extremists 
of  Germany,  together  with  their  Futurist  brethren 
in  Italy.  He  shares  with  them,  too,  an  inability 
to  create  a  perfect  fusion  of  his  elements,  though 
he  has  not  so  clearly  broken  away  from  the  old 
technique,  which  has  a  habit  of  making  diconcert- 
ing  appearances  even  in  his  best  work.  Nor  should 
we  forget,  in  all  such  comparisons  as  these,  that  the 
term  "Expressionism",  applied  to  modern  German 
dramatists,  is  quite  meaningless  unless  modified  by 
a  knowledge  of  the  playwright  to  whom  it  is  applied.^ 

This,  then,  is  the  sketch  of  a  man  who  is  but  at 
the  beginning.  And  with  him  and  Susan  Glaspell, 
it  may  be,  begins  the  entrance  of  the  United  States 
drama  into  the  deeper  currents  of  continental  waters. 
O'Neill  flaunts  no  narrow,  mistaken  nationalism;  he 
apotheosizes  no  "ism";  he  digs  down  into  the  subsoil 
of  common  humanity.  Already  he  has  produced,  in 
the  new  forms,  a  pair  of  pieces  challenging  compar- 
ison with  the  best  that  foreign  youth  has  brought 
forth  in  the  same  time,  and  that  emerges  victorious 
out  of  the  test.  Every  favor  of  circumstance  is 
with  him — the  press,  the  critics,  the  playhouses. 
The  rest  is  in  him,  and  in  his  artistic  duty  not  to 
be  content,  as  heretofore  he  has  been,  with  second- 
or  third-best. 

'  See  section  on  Germany. 


472        THE  DRAMA  OF  TRANSITION 

SUSAN  GLASPEUL 

Between  Susan  Glaspell  and  Eugene  O'Neill  there 
lies  a  fundamental  artistic  difference  that  may  be 
rooted  in  the  difference  ot  sex  as  well  as  of  tempera- 
ment. Allowing  for  the  fact  that  clear-cut  contrasts 
are  more  or  less  illusory,  we  may  yet  assert  that 
where  O'Neill  is  at  bottom  the  man  of  feeling, 
Glaspell  is  the  woman  of  thought.  From  this  dis- 
tinction may  be  derived  a  list  of  antitheses.  With 
O'Neill's  overflow  of  feeling  comes  a  straining  toward 
violence  and  melodrama;  he  reveals  little  humor;  he 
is  fond  of  primitive  persons,  usually  men  bent  upon 
achieving  their  purpose  at  whatever  cost;  he  is 
voluble,  as  if  his  persons'  thoughts  were  stnicgling 
to  clarity  through  the  mist  of  inchoate  feelinirs. 
Glaspell's  intensity  of  thought,  on  the  other  hand, 
induces  a  straining  toward  wit,  an  eminently  in- 
tellectual process;  her  humor-  leaving  aside  the 
question  of  its  body  or  successfulness-  presupposes 
persons  of  sophistication.  As  O'Neill  inclines  toward 
the  masterful  man,  so  she  leans  toward  the  rebellious 
woman.  Where  the  author  of  The  Hair\  Ape  spurts 
out  words  like  the  gushing  of  a  geyser,  Glaspell  is 
reticent,  laconic;  O'Neill  is  expression,  where  Glas- 
pell is  repression.  "Do  you  know,  dearest",  says 
Ian  in  her  Tickless  Timey  "you  are  very  sensitive  in 
the  way  you  feel  feeling?  Sometimes  I  think  that  to 
feel  feeling  is  greater  than  to  feel." 

Now,  Miss  Glaspell  is  indeed  very  sensitive  in  the 
way  she  feels  feeling,  and  by  that  very  token  is  she  the 
woman  of  thought,  for  the  process  implies  an  acute 
consciousness  of  one's  emotions,  a  standing  outside 
of  them  even  as  they  are  being  experienced.     And 


THE  UNITED   STATES  473 

this  is  precisely  what  her  most  significant  characters 
are  forever  doing,  until  their  very  language  acquires 
a  difference  from  ordinary  expression  that  renders  it 
exotic  and  mirrors  the  exotic  difference  of  the 
characters.  They  speak  of  their  "otherness",  of  the 
"outness",  or  "apartness",  as  no  character  in 
O'Neill  has  ever  spoken.  For  language,  too,  is  a 
matter  of  sophistication,  and  though  O'Neill's  people 
feel  their  "otherness",  they  do  not  feel  the  feeling, 
to  use  lan's  words;  they  have  not  achieved  self- 
consciousness.  It  is  thus  something  more  than 
mere  playing  with  words  to  affirm  that  where 
O'Neill  feels  his  thoughts,  Glaspell  thinks  her  feel- 
ings. Contrast  the  descent  of  The  Emperor  Jones 
and  his  white  brother  The  Hairy  Ape  with  the 
ascent  of  Madeline  in  Glaspell's  Inheritors  or  of  the 
overwrought  Claire  in  The  Verge  and  the  seeming 
trickery  of  words  acquires  validity.  "Do  you  know 
why  you're  so  sure  of  yourself?"  cries  Claire  to  her 
daughter,  Elizabeth.  "Because  you  can't  feel. 
Can't  feel — the  limitless — out  there — a  sea  just  over 
the  hill."  Miss  Glaspell's  underscoring  of  the  word 
feel  reveals  the  difference  in  thought  which  she  packs 
into  that  word. 

But  thought,  too,  has  its  misty  zones,  and  more 
than  once  Glaspell  flutters  into  them.  "We're 
held  by  our  relations  to  others — "says  Fejevary  in 
Inheritors.  So  far,  so  good.  Few  plays  fill  one  with 
a  realization  of  these  necessary,  yet  numbing,  ties, 
as  deeply  as  does  Inheritors.  Then  the  speaker  adds, 
" — by  our  obligations  {vaguely)  to  the  ultimate 
thing."  Now  that  "ultimate  thing"  is  what  troubles 
one   even   in    Miss   Glaspell's    best   work,   such    as 


474        THE  DRAMA  OF  TRANSITION 

Bernice.  The  vaguely  of  her  stage  direction  is  some- 
thing that  bothers,  not  only  Mr.  Fejevary,  but  herself 
and  her  women  protagonists  as  well.  Now  and  again 
her  women — whether  in  her  lesser  things  or  in  her 
chief  labors — feel  "big  things",  but  with  that  same 
vagueness  which  necessitates  such  words  as  "other 
ness",  "apartness",  and  similar  crepuscular  forma- 
tions. Not  that  the  dramatist  is  wholly  unjustified 
either  in  word  or  procedure;  she  is  dealing  with 
twilight  persons,  transitional  souls,  in  the  nobler 
meaning  of  transition;  Claire  herself  is  perhaps  as 
puzzled  as  we;  she  is  a  Madeline  of  hiheritors 
grown  up  into  motherhood  and  complex  self- 
hood— a  Madeline  whose  problems  are  no  longer 
exclusively  social,  but  whose  individual  problem  is 
badly  crushed  beneath  the  weight  of  social  pressure. 
Such  a  grip  has  this  twilight  "apartness"  upon  Miss 
Glaspell  that  she  even  hints  abstractions  in  her 
stage-directions.  The  f^erge,  for  that  matter,  is  one 
long  abstraction  in  three  acts,  not  entirely  un- 
trammelled by  a  pervading  symbolism.  Glaspell, 
then,  as  a  serious  dramatist — one  of  the  few  .Amer- 
icans whose  progress  is  worth  watching  with  the 
same  eyes  that  follow  notable  European  effort— is 
largely  the  playwright  of  woman's  selfhood.  That 
acute  consciousness  of  self  which  begins  with  a  mere 
sense  of  sexual  differentiation  (exemplified  in  varied 
fashion  in  TrifleSy  Womafi's  Hoywr,  The  Outside) 
ranges  through  a  heightening  social  sense  {The 
People^  Close  the  Book^  Inheritors)  to  the  highest 
aspirations  of  the  complete  personality,  the  in- 
dividual {Bernice^  The  Ferge).  I  would  not  be 
understood  as  implying  that  these  plays  exhibit 
solely  the  phases  to  which   they  are  here  related; 


THE  UNITED   STATES  475 

all  of  Miss  Glaspell's  labors  are  an  admixture  of  these 
phases,  as  is  the  life  of  the  thinking  and  feeling 
woman  of  to-day.  And  there  is  more  than  rebellious 
womanhood  in  these  dramas;  there  is  consciousness 
of  valid  self,  or  of  a  passion  for  freedom,  of  dynamic 
personality;  there  is  craving  for  life  in  its  innermost 
meaning. 

Miss  Glaspell's  one-act  plays  run  the  gamut  from 
farce  to  drama.  At  times  her  more  comic  self  is  the 
caricature  of  her  more  serious.  Even  allowing  for 
the  influence  of  collaboration  in  Suppressed  Desires 
and  Tickless  Time,  are  not  these  laughable  creatures 
but  replicas  of  her  more  sober  protagonists  reflected 
in  a  distorting  mirror?  She  can  poke  fun  at  amateur 
Freudianism  gone  mad  {Suppressed  Desires)  and  then 
create  serious  characters  that  are  almost  clinical 
types  for  the  psychoanalytical  laboratory  (Bernice, 
The  Verge).  Even  her  farce  reveals  her  predominantly 
intellectual  interests,  as  witness  Tickless  Time. 
Everywhere  her  ideas,  as  opposed  to  her  feelings, 
will  out.  Thus  The  People  is,  in  part,  ostensibly  a 
satire  upon  the  cranks  that  infest  the  offices  of 
radical  publications,  but  the  dramatist  does  not 
seem  sure  of  her  footing.  Shall  it  be  straight  satire, 
burlesque,  or  what?  As  a  result  the  humor  becomes 
too  heavily  freighted  with  the  suggestion  of  serious- 
ness, the  characters  merge  into  caricature,  and  the 
spectator  listens  to  the  preachment  of  some  beautiful 
thoughts  that  live  as  words,  as  ideas,  but  surely  not 
as  drama.  So,  too.  Woman's  Honor,  containing  some 
acute  criticism  of  the  masculine  mind,  wavers  be- 
tween the  farce  and  the  serious  play. 

Out  of  the   conversation   in   the   sheriff's   house, 


476        THE  DRAMA  OF  TRANSITION 

among  the  women  who  have  assembled  to  save  the 
life  of  a  young  man  by  offering  as  sacrifice  their 
coveted  honor,  arises  a  protest  against  the  lily-white 
ideal  of  virtue  in  which  men  have  so  long  stifled 
woman's  passional  existence.  They  are  sick  of  man's 
"noble"  feeling  toward  womanhood  and  recognize, 
with  feminine  uncanniness,  the  source  of  that  feeling 
in  the  emotional  satisfaction  which  it  breeds  in  man. 
"Did  it  ever  strike  you  as  Kmny,"  asks  the  Scornful 
One,  "that  woman's  honor  is  only  about  one  thing, 
and  that  man's  honor  is  about  everything  but  that 
thing?"  And  later  in  the  same  piece,  from  the  same 
personage:  "Why,  woman's  honor  would  have  died 
out  long  ago  if  it  hadn't  been  for  men's  talk  about 
it."    And  the  Shicldctl  One: 

Oh,  I  hope  you  wonuii  can  work  out  some  way  to  free 
us  from  men's  noble  feelings  about  it!  I  speak  for  all  the 
women  of  my — {Hesitates)  undcr-worltl,  all  those  others 
smothered  under  men's  lofty  sentiments  toward  them! 
I  wish  I  could  paint  for  you  the  horrors  of  the  shielded  life. 
{Says  ''shielded"  as  if  it  were  ''shamefttr' .)  .  .  .  Our 
honor  has  been  saved  so  many  times.     We  are  tired. 

There  are  ideas  enough  in  this  little  piece  to  float 
more  than  one  long  social  satire,  yet  as  Miss  Glaspell 
has  presented  IFomaii's  Honor  it  is,  like  The  People^ 
valuable  for  the  detached  ideas  and  for  little  else. 
For  realism  it  is  patently  impossible;  for  satire  it  is 
too  bald;  for  fantasy,  too  corporeal.  The  piece  asks 
for  different  treatment  and  should  receive  it;  the 
idea  is  too  good  to  be  wasted  upon  an  indeterminate 
parlor  entertainment. 

The  same  predominance  of  idea  over  character 
and  plausibility  pervades  Close  the  Book,  in  which  the 


THE  UNITED   STATES  477 

social  status  of  Jhansi,  the  gypsy,  provides  the 
pivot  upon  which  turns  a  very  pithy  critique  of 
genealogical  snobbery  that  proves  a  boomerang. 
O'NeiU's  weakness,  particularly  in  his  one-act  plays, 
is  the  degeneration  of  feeling  into  a  melodrama  re- 
deemed by  gleams  of  originality  in  conception; 
Glaspell's  weakness  in  her  short  pieces  is  the  lapsing 
of  intellectuality  into  brittle,  discerning  statement 
with  little  relation  to  organic  artistry.  And  as 
O'Neill  triumphs  over  these  shortcomings  in  his 
later  and  longer  work,  so  too,  does  Miss  Glaspell  in 
her  longer  subsequent  pieces.  "Life  grows  over 
buried  life",  says  Allie  Mayo  in  The  Outside.  And 
art  grows  over  buried  art.  The  real  Glaspell  is  not 
in  these  one-act  plays,  however  often  they  may  be 
produced  and  read.  It  is  in  the  oft-cited  Trifles^ 
with  its  tribute  to  woman's  supposedly  finer  in- 
tuitions as  opposed  to  the  supposedly  coarser  fibre 
of  man, — with  its  wise  if  overdone  reticence — its 
foreshadowing  of  the  longer  dramas. 

CNeill's  women  do  not  understand  their  men- 
folk; recall  the  situation  between  Curtis  and  his 
wife  in  The  First  Man^  between  the  wives  and  their 
men  in  Ile^  in  Gold.  Glaspell's  men  do  not  understand 
their  women.  The  Prisoner,  in  Woman's  Honor^ 
rather  than  be  saved  by  the  chorus  of  self-sacrificing 
females,  cries  out,  "0/;,  hell.  Fll  plead  guilty!'' 
Craig,  in  Bernice,  has  neither  the  profound  intuitions 
that  flow  at  the  bottom  of  creative  artistry  (he  is  a 
writer  who  utterly  misses  the  tragic  plot  that  is  his 
own  married  life),  nor  the  appreciation  of  his  wife 
which  would  have  prevented  her  virtual  suicide. 
Fejevary,  in  Inheritors,  only  half  understands  his 


478        THE  DRAMA  OF  TRANSITION 

niece,  Madeline,  while  Professor  Holden,  who  under- 
stands her  attitude,  cannot  after  all  comprehend  her 
radical  action.  As  for  The  l^erge,  most  of  the  men 
are  entirely  at  sea  as  to  Claire,  and  none  more  so 
than  her  eminently  normal  husband. 

In  Bernice,  first  of  the  full-length  dramas,  Miss 
Glaspell  seems  to  carry  her  reticence  to  a  fault,  yet  I 
believe  her  method  is  fully  justified  because  it  is  a 
spiritual  mirror  of  Bernice's  own  life  tragedy.  To 
add  reticence  to  reticence,  Bernice  does  not  even 
appear,  she  is  dead  at  the  beginning,  yet  alive  in 
every  gesture,  every  utterance, made  by  her  mourners. 
(Compare  Glaspell's  method  in  Trifles.)  Her 
presence  fills  the  intensity  of  a  play  that  is  as  chary 
of  deeds  as  of  words;  here,  too,  the  idea  gives  life  to 
the  whole,  but  a  genuine,  dramatic  life.  The  talk 
is  all  of  her,  and  out  of  the  stray  phrases  a  vivid 
woman  arises  as  if  in  the  round  before  us.  Miss 
Glaspell's  irony  is  all  the  more  difficult  to  appreciate 
in  that  she  is  as  half-communicative  as  was  Bernice 
herself;  but  it  is  an  irony  that  cuts  sharply  and  deeply 
into  the  quick  of  existence.  A  double  irony,  even  as 
it  is  a  double  reticence;  for  her  women,  not  under- 
stood of  their  men,  but  half  understand  themselves. 
That  is  the  price  they  pay  for  their  ever-groping 
superiority. 

Inheritors,  dealing  with  a  social  rather  than  an 
individualistic  theme,  is  clearer  in  facture,  even  as 
Madeline  is  more  direct  in  deed.  Three  generations 
pass  before  our  eyes:  the  visionary  pioneer  who  has 
been  inspired  by  his  Hungarian  friend  with  an 
educational  ideal,  the  son  of  that  Hungarian  friend 
who  marries  the  pioneer's  daughter  and  becomes  the 
president  of  the  college  founded  by  his  father-in-law, 


THE  UNITED   STATES  479 

the  motherless  niece  of  that  president.  Again 
irony,  for  the  vision  of  the  pioneer  degenerates  into 
the  corrupted  and  corrupting  opportunism  of  the 
college  president.  But  hope,  too.  For  the  brave 
niece  refuses  to  profit  by  her  uncle's  social  influence; 
she  champions  the  cause  of  a  handful  of  liberty- 
loving  foreigners  at  a  time  when  free  speech  has  been 
forgotten  in  her  own  country,  preferring  the  jail  of 
the  body  to  the  jail  of  ideas.  A  heroine  of  the 
Glaspell  tradition,  then,  who  conquers  her  feelings 
in  the  glorious  battle  of  the  Idea. 

Out  of  this  play  rises  not  only  the  irony  of  the 
succeeding  generations,  but  that  of  life's  inextricable 
tangle  itself.  These  are  no  conventional  heroes, 
heroines,  and  villains  of  a  cause.  The  danger  that 
besets  the  dramatist  now  and  again  in  her  one-act 
pieces  is  here  conquered  through  a  thorough  im- 
mersion in  her  theme.  "If  you  sell  your  own  soul," 
explains  Holden,  the  independently-minded  professor 
who,  for  the  sake  of  his  sick  wife,  must  recede  from 
his  noble  stand,  "it's  to  love  you  sell  it".  Whereupon 
Madeline:  "That's  strange.  It's  love  that — brings 
life  along,  and  then  it's  love — holds  life  back."  This, 
to  me,  is  fully  as  important  in  the  play  as  are  Made- 
line's social  heroics  or  the  shifting  of  values  from 
one  generation  to  the  other.  And  I  may  be  pardoned 
if  I  call  attention  to  the  punctuation  of  the  sentence 
just  quoted  from  Madeline — to  the  dashes.  That  is 
the  way  Miss  Glaspell's  women  talk — with  words 
occasionally  underscored  and  parted  by  dashes. 
This  is  no  idiosyncrasy  of  orthography,  I  imagine. 
It  is  the  intellectual  groping  of  one  who  feels  her 
feelings. 

It  is  in  the  final  act  of  Inheritors  that  Madeline's 


480        THE  DRAMA  OF  TRANSITION 

mentally  unbalanced  father,  Ira,  at  last  breaks  his 
brooding  silence  and  pours  forth  a  flood  of  words  that 
for  all  their  apparent  rambling  are  pregnant  with  far- 
seeing  sanity.  Another  irony,  this.  And  it  is  in  The 
Verge  that  insanity  becomes  almost  the  only  sanity 
open  to  the  shut-in  personality  of  Claire.  Her 
speech  in  the  opening  act  may  stand  as  epigraph  to 
the  play: 

{fVith  difficulty,  drawing  herself  back  from  the  fascination 
of  the  precipice.)  You  think  I  can't  smash  anything? 
You  think  life  can't  break  up  ami  go  outside  what  it  was? 
Because  you've  gone  dead  in  the  form  in  which  you  found 
yourself,  you  think  that's  all  there  is  to  the  whole  ad- 
venture? And  that  is  called  sanity.  .And  made  a  virtue — 
to  lock  one  in.  You  never  worked  with  things  that  grow! 
Things  that  take  a  sporting  chance — go  mad — that 
sanity  mayn't  lock  them  in— from  life  untouched— from 
life — that  waits. 

Now  this,  as  Dick  soon  tries  to  explain,  is  merely 
"the  excess  of  a  particularly  rich  temperament", 
and  certainly  the  playwright  has  succeeded  in  pro- 
jecting a  sense  of  the  bewilderment  that  Claire 
works  upon  her  husband,  her  daughter,  and  her 
friends.  Among  these  is  included  the  one  whom  she 
loves,  who  breaks  through  to  her  (to  use  her  own 
style  of  expression)  too  late.  "No,  I'm  not  mad," 
cries  Claire  as  the  obsession  grows  upon  her.  "I'm 
too — sane!" 

It  would  be  easy  to  select  strange-sounding  pas- 
sages from  the  progress  of  Claire  to  the  murder  of 
him  she  most  loves,  and  to  make  easy  mock  of  them. 
Her  "outness",  "otherness",  "aliveness",  provide  jut- 
ting pegs  upon   which  uncomprehending  reviewers 


THE  UNITED   STATES  481 

may  hang  the  pearls  of  their  journalistic  wit.  They 
are,  as  we  have  seen,  merely  verbal  images  of  the 
woman's  difference  from  her  spiritual  milieu.  A  more 
valid  criticism  would  be  directed  against  the  unre- 
lieved tension  of  its  straining  toward  something  which 
never  becomes  quite  clear.  That  same  criticism  may 
be  leveled  against  Bernice^  as  may  the  opposite 
against  the  too  symetrically  patterned  Inheritors. 
Yet  The  Verge  is  the  brave  protest  of  an  artist-soul 
against  the  cramping  patterns  of  existence.  It  is 
filled  with  the  cry  that  ends  one  of  Amy  Lowell's 
best  poems:  "Christ!  What  are  patterns  for?" 
"Alles  Ewige  die  Erfiillung  furchtet,"  declares  some- 
one in  Franz  Werfel's  most  recent  drama,  Bocks- 
gesang.  "All  things  eternal  fear  their  fulfillment." 
True,  a  paradox  lurks  in  the  phrase,  but  few  words 
could  better  describe  the  fear  in  which  Claire  lives 
amidst  the  plants  which  she  is  trying  to  nurture  into 
new,  inedited  existences — the  plants  which  are  the 
symbol  of  her  own  little  world.  And  something  of 
of  this  same  fear  keeps  Miss  Glaspell  at  times  half 
mute — chokes  her  personages  with  the  fulness  of 
unplumbed  possibilities. 

It  is  this  refusal  to  be  shut  up  into  a  shell,  this 
everlasting  aspiration  toward  newer  and  different 
life,  that  Miss  Glaspell  has  significantly  breathed 
into  her  long  plays.  All  in  all,  here  is  a  dramatist 
who  oversteps  mere  national  cataloguing.  What 
she  has  already  done  pledges  her  to  even  higher 
things. 

SI 


INDEX 


Abramovitsch,  339,  340,  341 

Adler,  357 

/Eschylus,  225,  274 

Ainslie,  41 

Aksenfeld,  338,  341,  349 

Alas,  Leopoldo  (Clarfn),  75, 
77,  78,  84 

Albane,  Blanche  (Mrs.  Du- 
hamel),  256 

Aleikhem,  Sholom,  367 

Altamira,  Rafael,  78 

Alvarez-Quintero,  Seraffn  y  Joa- 
quin, 89,  121 

d'Amico,   Silvio,    174,    180,    181 

Amiel,  95 

Andreyev,   166,  367,  398 

An-ski  (S.  Z.  Rappoport),  425, 
426,  427,  433 

Antonelli,  174 

Archer,  W.,  27,  28,  437 

Aretino,  Pietro,  33 

Aristotle,  26,  32,  33,  36,  192 

Ascisubi,  Hilario,  213 

Asch,  S.,  366,  368,  373-379, 
392,  420,  424 

Ayala,  R.  Perez  de,  74,  81,  82, 
84,  85,  86,92,  96,97,  101,  118 

Azorfn  (Jose  Martinez  Ruiz),  95 

B 

Bach,  165 

Bacon,  37 

Baker,  391 

Bakshy,  437,  440,  452 

Balzac,  78,  79,  95 

Banks,  61 

Baroja,  28,  93,  94,  95,  96,  102, 

108 
Barrie,  23,  24,  25,  153 
Bartels,  269,  270,  286,  301 
Barzilai,  125 


Bechofer,  437 

Beethoven,  55,  165,  252 

Belasco,  56,  57,   153 

Bellini,  165 

Ben-Ami,  418 

Benavente,    13,  47,   74,  81    87 

95,    96-121,    239,    240,    294' 

438,  449 
Benelli,  126,  127,  130,  131,  132- 

140,  146,  149,  152,  153 
Bennet,  31 
Bernhardt,  165,  256 
Bernstein,  237 
Best,  254,  255 
Betrone,  149 
Bianchi,  210 
Bierstadt,  213,  214 
Bimko,  421,  424 
Blanco-Garcia,  67 
Boiieau,  27 
Booth,  356 
Bordeaux,  266 
Borelli,  132 
Borgese,  127 
Bossu,  27 
Boyd,  15 

Bracco,  126,  184,  227,  241 
Brieux,  72,  73,  237 
Brighouse,  245 
Brill,  298 
Brink,  50 
Brunetiere,  32 
Buchner,  274 
Bueno,   80,   84,  85,  86,  92,   95 

101,  105 

C 

Calder6n,  72,  87,  153,  210 

Campbell,  Mrs.,  62 

Campo  (del),  213 

Carlyle,  32,  33,  39,  40,  41,  211 

Carminati,  132 

Castelvetro,  36,  37,  39,  239 


483 


484 


INDKX 


Cayacchioli,  174,  201,  203 
Cejador  y  Frauca,  94,  95 
Cervantes,  83,  84 
Chariot,  446 
Chatrian,  78 

Chiarelli,  132,  173,  174,  179,  181 
Chopin,  165 
Cione,  Otto  M.,  209 
Clarfn  (see  Alas,  Leopold) 
Claik,  B.  H.,  89,  250 
Claudel,  166 
Coquelin,  37 
Coriat,  49 
Corneille,  251 
Coronado,  Martin,  216 
Corra,  166 
Costa,  94 

Craig,  439,  440,  445,  446 
Croce,    14.    23,    i2,    34.   38,   41, 
42,  43,  151 

D 
D'Annunzio,   93,   95.    129,    146. 

152,  153,  162 
Dante,  42,  43,  69,  112 
Darfo,  95 
Darwin,  52 
Dicenta,  73,  89,  92 
Dickens,  78,  95 
Diderot,  37 
Diebold.  276,  278,  319 
Drinkwater,  111 
Duhamcl,   Georges,   254-266 
Duhamel,     Mrs.     (see    Albanc, 

Blanche) 
Dukes,  9,  29,  30,  31,  32,  144 
Dumas,  67 
Dunsanv,  380 
Duse,  143,  165 


Echagiie,  J.  P.,  209,  210  (pseu- 
donym, Jean  Paul) 

Echegarav,  Jose,  13,  61-74,  87, 
89,  93,  95,  96,  103,  107,  120, 
237,  372 

Echegaray,  Miguel,  62 

Edschmid,  272 

Einstein,  52 

Ellis,  Havelock,  9 

Engel,  249 


Erckmann,  78 
Ernst,  271 

Ettin^or.  337,  343,  345 
Euripides,  274 

Evreinov,    51,     128,     191,    201, 
437-453,  457,  458 


Fasset.  Jr..  94,  213 
Faversliam,  62 
Fickc,  321 

Fitzmaurice-Kclly,  72,  75.  7.S.  7') 
Ford.  J.  D.  .M..  80 
For  n  ion  i,  125 

Forzano.  127,  132,  152-160 
Franihctti,  148 
Francia,  211 
Frcgoli.  165 

Freud.  49,  50,  51,  52,  201,  298. 
442,  443 


C.al(l<'«  (sec  Pf'rcz  Gald(!>s) 

Calsworthy,  31,  47.  SS.  S9 

(iarda  Vclloso.  E.,  20<;,  217 

Gautiei,  95 

GeorKc,  Stefan,  312 

Gtrstenl)crg,  201 

(ihiraldo.  217 

Giacosa,  232 

(;in>ert,  147,  312 

Ciiusti,  215,  216,  217,  224 

(iiasfKll,  51,  201,  471,  472-481 

(iocring,  322 

Goldfadcn,  341,  342,  343.  344, 

345.  346.  347,  348,  349,  350, 

351.  352,  353,  354,  356,  358, 

359,  363,  366 
dc  Gourmont,  Rcmy,  276 
Gonz41cz,  Castillo,  209 
Goethe,  32,  33,  39,  40,  41.  52, 

257,  271,  273,  320.  356,  360, 

374 
Gogol,  48,  360,  440 
Gonziles   Blanco,  Andr6s.    101, 

106 
Gordin,  356,  357,  358,  359,  360, 

361,  362,  363,  364,  365.  366, 

369,  388 
Gorin,  334 


INDEX 


485 


Gorki,  216,  227,  308,  367,  372, 

423  424 
Gottlober,  335,  343,  345 
Grabbe,  274 
Gradner,  347,  348,  350 
Gregory,  416 
GrilTparzer,  271,  360 
Groussac,  211 
Guimera,  89 
Gutierrez,  Eduardo,  213 
Gutierrez,  J.  M.,  213 
Gutierrez,  Ricardo,  213 
Gutzkow,  350 

H 

Hapgood,  372 

Hardy,  142 

Hasenclever,  111,  230,  274,  277, 

286-302,  310,  318,  458 
Hauptmann,    10,   47,    HI,   278, 

279-286,  318,  360,  362 
Hebbel,  271,  276,  360 
Hegel,  33 
Heracleitus,  10 
Herder,  33 
Hernandez,  212,  213 
Heyse,  394 
Hirschbein,  366,  368,  373,  392, 

404-420,  427,  432 
Hofmannsthal,  30,  271,  274,  275 
Holz,  270 
Hugo,  67,  360,  372 
Hurwitz,  355,  358,  363 

I 

Ibsen,  10,  27,  31,  67,  70,  71,  72, 
84,  85,  88,  95,  114,  133,  141, 
166,  167,  227,  241,  276,  303, 
260 

Immerman,  275 

Iglesias  Paz,  209 

Irving,  356 


Jameson,  9,  10,  23,  26,  29,  31, 
32,  53,  73,  92,  114,  119,  121, 
144,  198,  449 

Jeliflfe,  50 

Tones,  49 

Jonson,  Ben,  392 


K 

Kahn,  A.,  434 

Kaiser,    Georg,     111,    302-313, 

318,  319,  324,  458 
Kalish,  Bertha,  357,  358,  369 
Kamrasch,  343 
Katzenellenbogen,  350 
Kautsky,  249 

Keaton,  "Buster",  452 

Kerr,  303 

Kleist,  271 

Kobiin,  366,  368-373,  420 

Kokoschka,   276,  304,  313-318, 

319,  458 
Kornfeld,  269,  273,  319 


Laharpe,  27 

Lamb,  37,  239 

Lange,  271 

Lateiner,  355,  357,  358,  363 

Lawrence,  D.  H.,  50,  51 

Leguizamon,  215 

Lerner,  350 

Lessing,  37,  334,  337,  360 

Levinsohn,  J.  B.,  339 

Levinsoiin,  Ludwig,  336 

Lewes,  374 

Lewisohn,   Ludwig,   23,   25,   26, 

27,  37,  42,  55,  99,  275,  391, 

400,  434 
Libin,  366,  369 
Librescu,  345 
Liiienblum,  350 
Linares  Rivas,  89,  98 
Linati,  142 
Linetzki,  344 
Lope  de  Rueda,  117 
Lope  de  Vega,  61,  64,  88,  114 
Lopez  de  Ayala,  63 
Lopez,  Sabatino,  126,  184 
di  Lorenzo,  Tina,  148 
Loving,  121 
Lowell,  Amy,  481 

M 

MacClintock,  190 

Macgowan,  Kenneth,  118,  162, 

275,  458,  465 
Mackaye,  243 


486 


INDEX 


Madariaga,  Salvador,  dc,  48,  49 
Maeterlinck,    25,   87,    166,   274, 

380,  394,  400 
Klaeztri,  95 
Marinetti,     127,    132,     160-172, 

204,  270,  272,  301,  452 
Marino,  243 
Marmootel,  27 
Marquina,  89 

Martinez  Cuitino,  209,  217 
Martinez  Sierra,  102,  106 
Martini,  175 
Marx,  249 
Mascagni,  141 
Matthews,  Brander,  37,  41 
Maupassant,  372 
Mayol,  165 

Mencken,  29,  52.  94,  378 
Mendelssohn,  334 
HVleyerhoid,  438,  440 
Mirbcau,  87 
Mistral,  61 
Mitre,  213 
Mogalesco,  350 
Molnar,  21,  110,  308 
Moli^re,  27,  37.  99.  117 
Mordell,  49 
Morello,  125 
Morley,  S.  G.,  121 
Morselii,  127,  132,  145-152 
Muir,  42,  43,  44,  45 
Musset,  95 

N 
Naidenov,  367 
Nathan,  G.  J.,   23,  25.  27.  39, 

41,  42 
Netto,  Coclho,  244,  245 
Nietzsche,  23,  29,  31,  47,  52.  95 
Nirdlinger,  61 
Norwood,  32 

O 
Obligado,  213 
O'Neil,  Nance,  97 
O'Neill,   Eugene,   51,    100,   201, 

236,  237,  275,  308,  309,  458- 

471,  472,477 
Ortega  y  Gasset,  95 
Ostrovsky,  360 


Papini,  127,  133,  145,  146 


f'arker.  H.  T.,  110 

Paul,  Eden  and  Cedar,  250 

"Paul.  Jean"  (see  EchagOe).  210 

Pavro,  209.  217 

Pcfia.  217 

Pereda.  74,  76,  77,  80.  94 

Perez.  I.  L.,  367,  379.  381.  382. 

426 
Perez-Gald69,  13.  64.  73.  74-92. 

93.  94.  96 
Perez- FVt it,  209.  217 
I'helps,  \V.  L..  25.  89 
Phillips,  Frances.  94 
Pilo.  125 
Pin^.  331 
Pinski.  364.  366.  368,  373,  379- 

403.  420.  427 
Pirandello,    108,    12A.    127.    132. 

148.  153.  173-199.  204.452 
Po<lest4,  213.  214.  216,  230 
Poe,  95 
P<)|)e.  13.  32 
l'orro<i6n.  103 
F'otajx'nko.  437.  440 
F'raga.  153 
Prcscott.  49 
F'rezzolini.  145 
F'uccini.  Mario.  127 

O 
Quintcro  (sec  Alvarcz-Quintcro) 


Rabcntos.  123 

l^cine,  251 

Ramos.  J.  A..  237-243 

Rapfxjport  (sec  An-ski) 
Ratti.  147 

Reirher,  Emmanuel.  418 
Reid.  Mavne.  438 
Reinhardt.  375.  3SS.  392 
Renan.  253 
Ribot.  443 

Ricciardi.  129.   130.  131 
Rimsky-F<orsakofT.  438 
Rodo.  Jos^  Enrique.  29.  218 
Rodriguez.  R.  Fausto.  213 
Rojas,  Fernando  de,  116 
Rojas  V  Zorrilla,  64 
Rolland,  249-254 
Romero.  Svlvio.  243 
Rosen  f  eld, '330 


INDEX 


487 


Rosso  di  San  Secondo,  174,  199, 

200,  201 
Rostand,  153 
Roxlo,  Carlos,  229,  230 
Ruberti,  125 
Russo,  142 


Salvini,  356 

Sdnchez,    Florencio,    215,    217, 

218-237,  245 
S&nchez  Gardel,  217 
Santayana,  55 
Sarcey,  37 
Sarmiento,  213 
Sayler,  437,  438,  439 
Scaliger,  33 

Scardaoni,  127,  129,  130,  131 
Schiller,  271,  274,  349,  356,  360 
Schneider,    270,    271,    272,    273, 

274,  275,  296 
Schnitzler,  401 
Schopenhauer,  276 
Schwartz,  368,  421,  425 
Scott,  211 

Seiffert,  334,  351,  352 
Settimelli,  165 
Shaikewitsch,  350,  356 
Shakespeare,  35,  37,  52,  69,  82, 

85,  95,  98,  99,  101,  111,  117, 

152,  154,  160,  165,  167,  253, 

301,  356,  362 
Shaw,  Bernard,  72,  73,  107,  108, 

121,  166,  173,  197,  198,  376, 

440,  444,  450,  461 
Shay,  Frank,  121 
Sheridan,  70 
Shestov,  Leo,  29,  44 
Shidlovski,  433 
da  Silva,  J.  A.,  243 
Simoni,  143 
Sologub,  128 
Sophocles,  35,  50,  51,  52,  274, 

295 
Sorge,  269 

Souza,  Claudio  de,  243-246 
Spence,  E.,  437 
Spencer,  52,  95 
Spingarn,    Joel    Elias,    28,    32, 

34,  37,  38,  39,  41,  42 
Sternheim,  303,  319 
St.  John,  C,  437,  440 
Strindbersr,  10,  31,  274,  276 


Stuart,  D.  C,  63 
Sudermann,  31 
Synge,  142,  416 


Talli,  149,  204 
Tamayo  y  Baus,  63 
Tieck,  275 

Toller,  Ernst,  322,  323,  324 
Tolstoi,  72,  95,  359 
Tomasheffsky,  354,  357,  358 
Turgeniev,  372 
Turrel,  C.  A.,  89 

U 
Unamuno,  95 

Underhill,  J.  G.,  98,  100,  114 
von  Unruh,  Fritz,  318,  319,  320 
Untermeyer,  L.,  434 


Valle-Incl4n,  95 

Verga,  G.,  93,  126,  132,  141-145 

Verissimo,  228 

Verlaine,  95,  271 

Viel  Castel,  63 

Viergol,  208 

W 
Wagner,  165 
Wedekind,    51,    111,    201,    274, 

277,  301,  303,  304,  317 
Wei  f el,    Franz,    274,    278,    311, 

320,  321,  481 
Whitman,  210,  256 
Wiener,  334,  337,  368,  372,  434 
Wilbrandt,  271 
Wilde,  312 
Wildenbruch,  271 
Woollcott,  468 
Wundt,  443 


Yeats,  380,  400 
Yehoash,  330,  331 


Zacconi,  165,  227 
Zamacois,  89 
Zangwill,  369,  370 
Zunser,  Eliakum,  334,  346 
Zweig,  Stefan,  250 


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